KARACHI: The sales of locally assembled cars have dropped by 4.5 percent to 162,692 units during July – January 2018/2019 as compared with 170,354 units in the same period of the last fiscal year.
Analysts said that the decline car sales were due to jump in prices and restriction imposed on non-filers to register new cars.
However, the government lifted this restriction through amendments made in Finance Supplementary (Second Amendment) Act, 2019.
Analysts at Topline Research said Pakistan Auto sales are down by 13 percent YoY in February 2019, as against 4.5 percent YoY decrease in January 2019.
Moreover, sales are down 13 percent MoM which can be attributed to lower number of working days in February compared to January.
To note, measures in economic reforms package are expected to support declining volumes, however, volumes will still see a downward trend in months to come, in our view, due to slow down in economy as well as significant jump in prices in last 15 months.
Total sales during 8MFY19 have come in at 163K units, down by 4.5 percent YoY.
Indus Motors (INDU) reported YoY growth yet again (up 8 percent YoY in Feb 2019) as the strong (albeit thinning) order book continues to support sales. Fortuner sales rose 80 percent YoY, first YoY increase in 8 months, while Corolla continued its growth trend with sales up 23 percent YoY.
On the other hand Hilux sales fell 72 percent YoY, highest YoY decline in 19 months.
Pak Suzuki (PSMC) continued to report YoY decline in sales, down by 17 percent YoY in Feb 2019. Sales decline was led by Mehran, Bolan, Swift, Cultus and Ravi variants down by 33 percent YoY, 18 percent YoY, 28 percent YoY, 14 percent YoY and 14 percent YoY, respectively.
Wagon-Rwas the only PSMC variant to record growth YoY (up 16 percent YoY).
Honda cars (HCAR) sales fell 27 percent YoY, worst YoY decline since Apr 2012. This coincides with worst YoY decline in sales of city and civic variants, which fell by 24 percent YoY.
In addition to the economic factors, decline in City and Civic variants can also be attributed to the expected launch of Civic 1.5 Turbo (substitute for Civic 1.8) in coming months.
Simultaneously BR-V sales fell 45 percent YoY. To, note, BR-V sales have fallen YoY for the 10 consecutive month as the variant introduced in Apr 2017 loses its charm with the consumers.
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