Sedan sales slump
4/6/2004 15:54
May is perhaps a gloomy month for Chinese car manufacturers, with
sales down 20 percent from April, and car inventories at more than ten percent
of total output, eastday.com reported today.
The domestic car market has
sustained a 50 percent growth for three consecutive years. However, the
burgeoning car market seems to have limited space to expand, said an industry
analyst.
In the coming two or three years, a 20 to 25 percent surplus in
domestic sedan capacity is expected, the analyst pointed out.
Reasons for
last month's slump are not hard to find: higher thresholds for car loans;
expectations that car prices will soon align with the international market, have
many car buyers taking a wait-and-see attitude; frequent price wars are
frustrating car purchasers; many new models, lacking a proper target market, are
less popular; and markets for domestic small and mid-sized cities have not been
fully explored.
More significantly, most Chinese sedan manufacturers have not
prepared for the tough competition ahead, the analyst stressed.
Wendy Zhang/ Shanghai Daily news
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