Accelerating car sales hit the highest in 30 months

Vehicle sales reach 17,709 units, up 27% compared to previous year.

KARACHI: Touching the highest-ever figure in two and a half years, local car sales (including light commercial vehicles, vans and jeeps) in January 2015 hit 17,709 units, up by a significant 27% compared to 13,910 units in the same month last year.

During the first seven months (Jul-Jan) of fiscal year 2015, sales were up 13% to 85,135 units compared to 75,162 units in the same period last year, led by the new model of Toyota Corolla and demand under the Punjab Taxi Scheme.

A robust increase in tractor sales was also observed after the reduction in general sales tax (GST) in the last budget. In the first seven months, tractor sales surged by 25% to 24,397 units compared to 19,564 units in the corresponding period of last year.

Millat Tractors led the tractor segment in volumes by selling 14,965 units, up 28% year-on-year (YoY), followed by Al-Ghazi Tractors with 9,023 units, up 25%.

Amongst individual companies, sales of Pak Suzuki – the largest carmaker in Pakistan –increased by 13% YoY to 7,987 units in January 2015. Volumes also improved by 29% month-on-month. In Jul-Jan of fiscal year 2015, sales of Pak Suzuki rose by 2% to 43,643 units versus 42,581 units in the same period of last year.

The company witnessed improvement of 37% YoY in Suzuki Mehran sales and sold 3,467 units in January 2015 against 2,531 units in January 2014.



However, Ravi showed a slight improvement of 1% month-on-month to 1,285 units while sales of Bolan remained stable month-on-month.

Posting highest-ever monthly sales, Indus Motor – the makers of Toyota Corolla – sold 6,415 units in January 2015, up 61% compared to 3,992 units in the same period of last year.

On month-on-month basis, Indus Motor sales increased by 57% from 4,100 units in December 2014. During seven months, sales increased by 53% to 29,301 units.

Toyota Corolla posted an increase of 51% month-on-month to 5,864 units compared to 3,882 units in December 2014. “We attribute this increase to the sale of Corolla’s new model coupled with the New Year registration phenomenon.”

On a yearly basis, Corolla sales surged significantly by 63% compared to 3,611 units in the same month last year.

Honda Atlas Cars has posted highest-ever monthly sales in nine years. It sold 3,221 units in January 2015 compared to 2,600 units in the same month last year, up 24% YoY.

Published in The Express Tribune, February 12^th,  2015.

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