September 11, 2020 (MLN): Pakistan Automotive Manufacturers Association yesterday released the volumetric sale data for the month of August, which showed that the auto sector experienced some recovery as there was a 8.3% increase in the sale of passenger cars.
What really stood out this month was that PSMC, surprisingly, showed recovery of 20% while INDU and HONDA suffered declines of 18% and 8% respectively as compared to last month. Ironically, it was PSMC that had suffered a MoM decline in the previous month whereas INDU and PSMC had shown recovery.
Yearly wise, HONDA emerged as the clear winner as it enjoyed a 72% increase in sales, while INDU followed the lead by posting a growth of 52%. PSMC, on the contrary, saw a decline of 9% as compared to the same month of last year.
Company-wise analysis of the data shows that the decline in INDU’s sales was attributed to the lower production capacity from a single shift. The sales were mainly supported by Toyota Yaris, which accounted for nearly 52% of the company’s overall volumetric sale. According to Taurus Securities, the company;s management is contemplating moving towards a double shift due to the backlog of upto 3 months in order books.
PSMC’s unexpected victory can be credited to the rise in the sales of Cultus, Wagon R and Ravi. In fact, almost all the variants of the company enjoyed growth except for Alto, who’s sales declined by 30% YoY on account of price hike.
Honda Cars’ successful recovery is courtesy of higher demand for sedans, which consequently helped in uplifting the sales of Civic and City by 72% YoY. This substantial growth also goes on to show that the entry of Toyota Yaris, or KIA’s sportage had minimal impact on these two variants.
Even though not formally registered on PAMA’s periodic sales data, KIA Lucky Motors managed to sell 1,500 units during the month, as per the channel checks of Topline Securities. Hyundai Nishat's latest SUV launch, Hyundai Tucson, too saw a sale of 22 units, along with the sale of 88 units of Porter H-100 during the month. It is being held that both of these companies are planning to give INDU and HONDA a run for their money by planning to bottleneck their production capacity from January 2021 onwards.
The total number of trucks sold during the year stood at 223 units, which translates into a growth of 2.3 percent as compared to the previous year. However, when compared to the month of July, the sales went down by 21% as farmers deferred buying tractors in the hopes that there would be a reduction in prices following reduction in GST on tractors from 5% to 0%.
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