The car market fell by 62% in February – Business – Kommersant

The dynamics of falling sales of new passenger cars and light commercial vehicles (LCV) in February remained at the level of the beginning of the year – the market decreased by 62% in annual terms. Compared to January, sales increased by almost 10,000 cars due to seasonality. More than half of sales in February came from Lada, but brands from China, against the background of the lack of official deliveries from other countries, occupy most of the top 10 of the market.

Sales of passenger cars and LCVs in the Russian Federation in February fell by 62.1%, to almost 41.9 thousand units, follows from the data of the Association of European Businesses (AEB) (.pdf). The dynamics of the market contraction in annual terms remained approximately at the level of January, when sales decreased by 63.1% and 32.5 thousand units were sold. As a result, in two months of 2023, the market amounted to almost 74.4 thousand cars.

The monthly data does not take into account the sales of BMW and Mercedes-Benz, as well as Chery and its other brands, since they report only quarterly. At the end of 2022, Chery Group brands occupied 7.8% of the market against 2.5% in 2021. The AEB data also does not take into account the import of cars bypassing distributors – through the so-called parallel import.

In 2022, against the backdrop of the cessation of official deliveries of cars from the EU, the USA and Japan, as well as the local production of foreign automakers in the Russian Federation, with the exception of Chinese ones, the car market decreased by almost 59%, to 0.69 million cars. Forecast AEB for 2023 assumes an increase in sales of new cars by 12%, to 0.77 million cars.

Remained the market leader in February Lada, the sales of which increased by 5% to 23.4 thousand cars. AvtoVAZ’s market share was 56% against 20.3% a year earlier. Nevertheless, half of the top 10, even excluding Chery, were occupied by Chinese brands. Ranked second in sales Havalsales of which grew by 49%, to 5.3 thousand units, then – Geely (growth by 85%, almost up to 4.1 thousand cars). Other brands from China also increased sales: changan — by 123%, up to 1.1 thousand vehicles; Great Wall — by 679%, up to 304 vehicles; FAW – by 63%, up to 293 pieces. Sales GAZ (2.6 thousand) and UAZ (1.5 thousand) fell by 31% and 9% respectively. Sollers — a new LCV brand launched by Sollers at the end of 2022 — sold 348 vehicles. Implementation Kiawhich before the crisis was the leader among foreign cars, fell by 90%, to 1.5 thousand cars.

In the model rating, Lada Granta continues to lead – last month it was still covered by preferential car loans. Next come Lada Niva and Haval Jolion.

Olga Nikitina