New vehicle sales up and down

(Image: Stuart Buchan, via Wikimedia Commons)

According to figures release today by the South African Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa (NAAMSA) 41 555 vehicles were sold in May. Of these 82.6% or 34 329 units represented dealer sales, 10.4% represented sales to the car rental industry, 5,1% went to industry corporate fleets and 1.9% of the cars were bought by government.

In May export sales also reflected a more subdued performance and at 22 063 vehicles had shown a decline of 8.8% compared to the corresponding month last year.

New car sales hold up 'reasonably well'

According to NAAMSA new car sales (despite one less sales day in May this year compared to the corresponding month a year ago) had held up "relatively well" and at 28 830 units reflected an improvement of 3106 new cars or 12.1% compared to the 25 724 new cars sold during May, 2010.

The association said the higher sales of new cars over the past 17 months reflected continued recovery on the consumption side of the economy largely driven by the 6.5% decline in interest rates since the end of 2008 and which had contributed to an improvement in the financial position of consumers and businesses through reduced debt servicing costs on the part of households and companies.

Sales of industry new light commercial vehicles, bakkies and minibuses at 10 609 units during May, 2011 reflected a reduction of 907 units or a fall of 7.9% compared to the 11 516 units sold in the corresponding month last year.

Exports down

Exports of South African produced motor vehicles also slumped by 8.8% in May, probably because of the high number of public holidays in April and May but NAAMSA said it expected this to improve over the medium term.

Constraints on the availability of components from Japan impacted on the production of certain product lines in South Africa and, together with shortages of various models sourced from Japan, this would have contributed to the slow down in the rate of growth in the new car and light commercial vehicle sales cycle for the month. These factors would also have contributed to lower aggregate industry exports.

"Despite current instances of limited supply and availability shortages, the industry remains on target to register overall growth in domestic sales of around 15% for 2011, whilst export sales are projected to increase by more than 25% year on year, " a spokesman said.