Mixed news, just in time for Australia to hang up shop in making cars, global sales are down 1% year on year according to Macquarie, mainly on the back of reduced demand in China and emerging markets:
From our database of 63 leading car markets, we estimate global car and light truck sales in August 2015 fell 1.0% YoY, slightly more than the 0.8% fall seen in July 2015. On a 3m rolling basis, a good guide to the underlying trend, sales were essentially unchanged YoY
The biggest increase came from the EU28, which gained an estimated 10.5% YoY, or nearly 80k additional cars and light commercial vehicles (LCVs).
The largest fall came from China, which we estimate including LCVs and imports was down 4.3% YoY, or 73k vehicles, then Brazil, down 24% YoY, and Russia, down 19% YoY.
The US and Japan, the 2nd and 4th largest global markets, saw only minor % changes.
Developed market car sales remain below their pre-crisis level, though they are slowly approaching it.
Meanwhile the astonishing growth in emerging market car sales has stalled since early 2014
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Not good news overall as a modest uplift in European car sales competes with China’s rolls over and US steadying – but still below Great Recession levels – even including its large population increase since:
And astonishing performance and value aside, low gas prices in the US are keeping the Tesla revolution at bay:
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The takeaway is these sales and falling industrial production in China are not giving commodities much of a leg up. While Europe is seeing a seasonal uplift and probably some great deals on Maseratis for all its QE-imbibed traders, even drastically lower oil prices aren’t giving the whole industry a lift.
