September’s Car Market
Korean automakers showed mixed performance last month. Hyundai Motor Company and Kia Motors took a serious hit from the labor strike. The former recorded a negative year-on-year growth for the first time in 13 years, and the latter’s monthly sales hit a record low. Meanwhile, GM Korea succeeded in raising its market share to close to 10%, and Renault Samsung Motors escaped from the bottom of the rankings. Ssangyong Motors continued its growth thanks to aggressive marketing, too.
Both Hyundai and Kia Suffered Drop in Sales Volume
Hyundai sold 46,257 cars in Korea and 317,713 abroad last month. Its global total sales volume decreased by 2.1% from a year earlier. The supply was not smooth, due to the partial strike and the Thanksgiving holidays, which resulted in a decrease in the number of operating days. Still, the solid overseas production growth made up for the loss to some extent.
The sales volume fell no less than 19.6% in the domestic market, while the auto manufacturer exported 68,086 cars and produced 249,627 units of vehicles abroad to post a 1.1% growth in the overseas market. The exports declined 26.5% from a year ago, but the local production in its overseas manufacturing facilities went up 12.7%.
Kia Motors sold 193,671 cars during the same month, 32,123 in Korea and 161,548 abroad, to show a 9.7% decrease and the poorest monthly performance since August 2012. Although its major models such as the Morning, K5, and Sportage R did well in the domestic market, the sell-through fell by 17.7% compared to last year due to the lack of inventory and the overall recession in the global auto industry.
GM Korea, Renault Samsung and Ssangyong Enjoyed Sales Increase
On the contrary, GM Korea’s domestic sales volume increased 18.5% year on year from 11,181 to 13,252. Also, it sold 39,962 vehicles in the third quarter of this year to set the highest Q3 record since its inception. It exported 49,600 cars to post an 8.7% decline from the 54,338 recorded in September 2012. It also exported 99,200 cars on a complete knock down (CKD) basis during the same period.
Renault Samsung Motors sold 4,957 in Korea and 6,246 cars abroad to climb a notch to fourth place. The SM5 and QM5 led sales growth. The former was chosen by 2,500 consumers to show a 4.9% month-on-month growth from 2,383, while the latter’s year-on-year sales growth rate amounted to 48.7%.
Ssangyong Motors, in the meantime, sold 4,432 cars in the domestic market and shipped 6,004 to overseas markets, many of them being the Korando series cars such as the New Korando C. The sale of this model is likely to further accelerate down the road. It is enjoying much popularity these days. Its sell-through is approximately 7,000 units as of now.