AutoBeta(AutoBeta.net)03/28 Report--

According to the data of the Federation of passengers, the market demand for high-end models is good from January to February 2023, but car imports are only 106000, a year-on-year drop of 30.3%. Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the Federation of passengers, pointed out that the core driving force of the growth of the import market is still the upgrading of consumption of passenger cars, so compared with ordinary fuel vehicles, the overall trend of luxury cars and imported cars is very good, but the electric transformation has changed the demand for fuel vehicles, and the demand for imported fuel vehicles has also dropped significantly, of which the import of Japanese imported cars is only 16000, down 65.7% from the same period last year.

By country, Japanese imported cars plummeted in February 2023, falling 80 per cent to 16220 compared with the same period last year, while Slovak imported cars fell 42 per cent, US imported cars fell 38 per cent and the UK fell 31 per cent. Meanwhile, German imported cars performed relatively well in February, up 12 per cent from a year earlier to 20735.

In terms of brands, the top three brands in February were BMW, Mercedes-Benz and Lexus, with BMW ranking first with 14190 vehicles, up 150% year-on-year, while Mercedes-Benz ranked second with 14035 vehicles, up 115% from the same period last year. In contrast, although Lexus sales also reached more than 10,000 vehicles, 10424 vehicles, but down 19% year-on-year, is the only brand in the top three to decline. In addition, imported brands such as Porsche, Land Rover, Audi, Toyota, Volvo and Maybach also grew significantly, while Lincoln fell 24% year-on-year.

In terms of sales in 2023, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, Lexus and Porsche all sold more than 10,000 vehicles, and the only brand that showed a decline was still Lexus, down 36% from the same period last year. According to the comprehensive data, the relatively strong performance of imported brands in recent years is Lexus, which leads brands such as BMW and Mercedes-Benz with sales of 219200 vehicles in 2022, but it is the first decline in sales since Lexus entered China in 2022, after 15 years of year-on-year growth of the brand. After entering 2023, the market performance of Lexus is not optimistic. The market believes that the slow progress of electrified transformation, the lack of intelligence of models, and the decline in performance-to-price ratio are the main factors that affect consumers' purchase of Lexus models, and in addition to traditional luxury brands, Ulay, ideals and other new power brands began to seize the luxury brand market, the first to bear the brunt is the second-tier luxury brands.

In terms of specific models, imported BMW X5 ranked first in sales in the first two months of this year, reaching 16923 vehicles, an increase of 116% over the same period last year. This was followed by Lexus ES, which sold just over 10275 vehicles in the first two months of this year, down 38 per cent from a year earlier. In addition, the cumulative sales of imported Mercedes-Benz GLBs and Mercedes-Benz GLE were 7386 and 7008 respectively. According to the comprehensive chart, most models showed growth in the first two months of 2023, with the exception of Lexus ES, Mercedes-Benz GLE, range Rover, Audi A5, Lincoln Voyager and so on.

At present, epidemic prevention and control has become normal, due to epidemic prevention and control, logistics freight blocked caused by little impact, and the impact of spare parts supply is also improving. Therefore, compared with 2022, the performance of China's imported car brands in 2023 should be improved, but at the same time, the competition in the import market is particularly fierce. The mainstream imported brands are still mainly selling fuel vehicles, and when new energy vehicles become the tuyere, the development of imported brands in the domestic market will also be affected.

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