Sales in the Premium Limousine segment continued falling in the second quarter of the year, albeit at a slower pace than in the first: 2 percent in Q2, versus 11 percent in Q1, resulting in an overall fall of 6 percent compared to the first half of 2015. The relative recovery in the second quarter is largely due to two models: the new BMW 7-series and, in particular, Cadillac CT6. [Read more…]
Sales in the Premium Large segment fell by 14 percent compared to the first half 2015, recording a slightly slower contraction in the second quarter compared to the first one (11 versus 18 percent, respectively). It is reasonable to expect the segment’s fortunes to improve further still in the second half of the year, as the new Mercedes-Benz E-class is proving quite popular and may pull up sales for the segment as a whole. [Read more…]
Sales in the Premium Mid-sized segment fell by 20 percent in the second quarter, exactly the same rate of decline as in Q1 2016. Once again, this is the worst performance from among all the Premium segments, and the second-worst performance from among all segments – only Alternative Power did worse, with sales falling by 21 percent. While things may yet pick up a bit now that the new Audi A4 and Jaguar XE are on sale, 2016 is turning out to be a bad year for the segment. [Read more…]
Sales in the Premium Compact segment fell by a slight 2 percent in the second quarter, erasing the segment’s gains for the year so far. Just as in the first quarter of 2016, however, the performance of the segment has to be viewed alongside the other Premium segments, sales for all of which shrank so far in 2016, including double-digit falls for the Premium Mid-sized and Premium Large segments.
The Chinese car market is back in booming territory in June with sales up 20% to just over 1,7 million units of locally produced models, with a Seasonally Adjusted Annualized Selling Rate of 22 million units, up a million over the last two months. The first half total now stands at 10,6 million sales, an increase of 11,1% over the first half of 2015. Crossover and SUV sales jumped 41% to 632.300 units on the previous year, as MPV sales also surged at +35% to 170.400 units. As familiar by now, sedans showed a slower improvement at +8,9% to 925.100 sales. Once again, the share of local brands drops again after beginning the year with a bang, standing at 37,7% in June, with a first half share of 40,4%, still slightly higher than the 40,1% of the full year 2015.
The Wuling Hongguang is once again the best selling model in China, after it was briefly outsold by the Haval H6 in April, but the three Volkswagen models in the top-8 (Lavida, Jetta and Sagitar) all show improvements of around 70%, as the VW brand is back to outperform the market and regain some of its lost market share. Behind the H6, the GAC Trumpchi is the only other crossover (and the fastest growing model) in the top-10, with the Buick Envision and Baojun 560 the only other crossovers in the top-15, as a slew of recently launched local models are storming the charts quickly, most notably the Changan CX70, breaking the 10.000 sales threshold, the Geely Boyue at over 8.000 sales for the first time and the BYD Yuan at over 6.000 sales after having been launched in March.
Ever since I checked out the Model S at a Tesla dealer, and put my e-mail down to get a test-drive, I’ve been getting the occasional e-mail from the carmaker. The other day I got an interesting e-mail ad for the new base Model X, the 60D, which suggested that, to quote: “The Model X 60D can later be upgraded through a software update to 75 kWh to increase range by about 20%. ”
Sales in the Large SUV segment grew by 12 percent in the second quarter of the year, faster than in either the Compact SUV or Mid-sized SUV segments. Overall, the growth since the beginning of the year is a more modest 5 percent, bringing the total of the cars sold to 141,341. [Read more…]
Sales in the Mid-sized SUV segment grew by 2 percent in the second quarter of the year, slightly slower than the 4 percent growth in the first quarter of the year, for a total of 868,715 cars in the first half of 2016. With such sales figures the segment finds itself in a bit of a no man’s land between the likes of Large and Minivan segments (both around 300,000 units over the half year) and segments like Compact or Large Pickup (both with slightly over a million units over the time period). However, if the Compact segment continues shrinking as it has been recently (down 6 percent in the first half of 2016), than the Mid-sized SUV sector will catch it sooner rather than later. [Read more…]
Sales of subcompact SUVs and crossovers continue booming in the US, almost doubling its sales to 183,758 units in the first half of 2016. While the growth rate in the second quarter, 50 percent, was not as impressive as the 162 percent growth rate the segment recorded in the first quarter, it still made it the fastest-growing segment by a mile – the second-fastest growing segment, Minivans, grew by 25 percent by comparison, while the market overall grew by only 1 percent over the first half of the year.
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Sales in the Compact SUV segment grew by 5 percent in the second quarter of the year, exactly the same rate of growth it achieved in the first quarter of the year. With growth continuing apace, and a total volume of 1,471,848 cars so far this year, the sector widened its lead over the shrinking Mid-sized sector as the largest single sector in the US. [Read more…]