New vehicle sales figures released by the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI) show a 9.1 percent drop on sales in October compared to the same time last year.

FCAI Chief Executive, Tony Weber, said that marked the nineteenth consecutive month of decreasing sales in the Australian market.

“Year to date sales of new motor vehicles in 2019 are almost 78,000 units (8 percent) lower than the same period in 2018,” he said.

“While the drought and other domestic conditions are impacting the market, our key concern is the effect over-regulation of the financial sector is having on new vehicle sales. The FCAI and our members have been concerned about the risk averse approach to lending in Australia for some time and see improved access to finance as a key to driving economic growth in 2020.

“Of particular interest is the fact that sales are down across all buyer types, with private sales down 5.2 percent compared to October 2018, business sales down 8.2 percent and government sales down 7.3 percent.”

Total sales for the month numbered 82,456 vehicles, a decrease of 8,262 vehicles or 9.1 percent, on October 2018.

During the month, the Sports Utility Market (38,648 units) fell by 3 percent compared to October 2018, while the Passenger Vehicle Market (23,553 units) was down 15.3 percent, and the Light Commercial Market (17,164) decreased by 11 percent.

The Toyota Hilux (3,516 units) was the top selling vehicle in October 2019, followed by the Ford Ranger (3,160), the Hyundai i30 (2,216) the Toyota RAV4 (2,132) and the Toyota Corolla (2,117).

Toyota remained the top selling marque for the month with 16,988 sales for 20.6 percent market share, followed by Hyundai (7,455 for 9 percent market share), Mazda (6,370 sales for 7.7 percent market share), Kia (5,062 sales for 6.1 percent market share) and Ford (4,891 for 5.9 percent market share).

Key points

• The October 2019 market of 82,456 new vehicle sales is a decrease of 8,262 vehicle sales or -9.1% on October 2018 (90,718) vehicle sales. October 2019 had the same number of selling days (26.4) as October 2018 and this resulted in a decrease of 313 vehicle sales per day.
• The Passenger Vehicle Market is down by 4,249 vehicle sales (-15.3%) over the same month last year; the Sports Utility Market is down by 1,201 vehicle sales (-3.0%); the Light Commercial Market is down by 2,122 vehicle sales (-11.0%); and the Heavy Commercial Vehicle Market is down by 690 vehicle sales (-18.2%) versus October 2018.

Toyota was market leader in October, followed by Hyundai and Mazda. Toyota led Hyundai with a margin of 9,533 vehicle sales and 11.6 market share points.