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NEWS
VFACTS for May: Consumer confidence to blame?
New-car sales have eased from last year's record high – for every month of 2014 so farVFACTS figures for May posted today reveal a steadily shifting market, with businesses apparently gearing up for an economic downturn.
Sales for the Australian market during the month of May amounted to 94,562 – 2226 fewer vehicles sold than in May 2013. That makes May the fifth consecutive month sales have been worse, year on year. It also points to the market falling into a sales trough for the full calendar year 2014 – with the final tally expected to show negative growth. This has not been the case since 2011, when natural disasters in Japan and Thailand brought to a crashing halt production of some of our biggest selling imported cars and the locally-built Toyota Camry and Aurion.
There will be much speculation as to why the market is down in 2014 – over 13,000 sales lost for the year to date (YTD) – but against a backdrop of declining consumer confidence it appears to be commercial fleets that are actually holding the market back. Business has bought fewer passenger vehicles, fewer SUVs and fewer LCVs so far this year. In something of a contrast, government has purchased more vehicles across all three classes. Private buyers have bought 7843 fewer passenger cars this year, but they've compensated by purchasing 8465 more SUVs and 337 more LCVs.
FCAI Chief Executive Tony Weber noted that business purchases declined during the month, with total business sales dropping by 9.1 per cent. Government and private sales rose 5.9 per cent and 1.6 per cent, respectively. And the malaise appears to affect most of the country.
"Sales declined in all states and territories, except New South Wales and South Australia," Weber was quoted saying in a press release issued by the FCAI today. "Sales in these two states remained steady, showing 0.3 and 0.1 per cent growth, respectively, when compared with May 2013 sales."
"Looking at year-to-date figures, new car sales in Western Australia have fallen a significant 10.4 per cent, compared to the same period in 2013.
"While new passenger car and light commercial vehicle sales declined by 6.3 and 3.6 per cent, respectively, SUV sales were strong, increasing 5.4 per cent compared to new SUV sales in May 2013. In particular, sales of small SUVs were up 18.8 per cent on May 2013 figures, and large SUV sales were up 10.4 per cent."
With YTD sales as at the end of May reaching 441,642 (versus 454,953 for the same period last year), the market looks to be on track for a seven-figure total by the end of 2014. The FCAI projects a final figure of 1.111 million, based on seasonally adjusted figures. But the 13,311 shortfall for the year so far will be difficult to make up – and that presumes that the buyers will return to the showrooms next month – the busiest of the year.
Top selling brands for the year to date are: Toyota (80,297), Holden (44,441), Mazda (42,536), Hyundai (39,589), Ford (33,527), Nissan (25,163), Mitsubishi (24,395), Volkswagen (21,974), Subaru (16,189) and Honda (12,328). Of the top 10 brands, only Holden and Hyundai have sold more cars than for the same period in 2013.
The 10 best selling cars during May were: Toyota Corolla (3871), Toyota Hilux (3313), Mazda3 (3291), Holden Commodore (2648), Hyundai i30 (2553), Ford Ranger (2317), Volkswagen Golf (2301), Mitsubishi Triton (2254), Mazda CX-5 (1715) and Jeep Grand Cherokee (1694).
And the 10 best selling cars for the year to date are: Mazda3 (18,465), Toyota Corolla (17,518), Toyota Hilux (14,884), Holden Commodore (13,199), Hyundai i30 (12,449), Ford Ranger (10,229), Mazda CX-5 (8795), Volkswagen Golf (8263), Toyota RAV4 (7976) and Toyota Camry (7740).
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Written byKen Gratton
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