Following months of year-on-year sales growth, thanks largely to a low base effect, combined automotive sales in Japan declined in September. The country’s automotive industry accounted for sales of 446,687 units last month, translating into a drop of 3.4% compared with a year earlier.
Last month’s decline hit both the passenger car and truck segments. Bus sales improved, but this was insufficient to offset the decline in the other segments, the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association (JAMA) reports.
In all, a total of 377,738 cars were sold in Japan last month, 3.7% fewer than what the industry had managed in September 2011. Toyota accounted for the bulk of the cars sold last month, at 112,654 units, down by nearly 5%. Suzuki (+10.4%), Daihatsu (+1.9%) and Subaru (+18.2%) were the only brands that managed an improvement in car sales last month.
Toyota led the truck market as well in September, accounting for sales of 12,356 units, a year-on-year drop of 0.7%. Truck brands that managed sales growth in September were Nissan, Isuzu, Hino and Suzuki. Overall, truck sales in Japan totalled 67,961 units in September, down 1.9% from a year ago.
A significant portion of bus sales in September were accounted for by the Toyota group, with its Toyota and Hino brands managing sales of 327 (+13.1%) and 288 (+73.5%) respectively. Total bus sales last month reached 988 units, up 16.8% on September 2011 levels.
The combined automotive market in September was led by Toyota, which sold a total of 125,337 cars, trucks and buses. Compared with the corresponding month in 2011, Toyota’s combined sales were down 4.5%, JAMA figures show.
In the first three quarters of 2012, total automotive sales in Japan grew 38.7% compared with the January-September 2011 period to 4,277,944 units. Sales of cars rose 41.4% to 3,664,531 units, trucks increased 24.3% to 603,742 units, and sales of buses in Japan grew 18.2% year-on-year to 9,671 units.
