Looking ahead, Kenanga Research says sales volume for September 2018 is expected to be lower than the August 2018 level with the ending of the zero-rated tax holiday. — Bernama photo
KUCHING: The auto sector’s total industry Volume (TIV) saw a 27 per cent jump to 65,600 units in August 2018 as analysts believe consumers took advantage of the final month with zero-rated Goods and Services Tax (GST).
The team at Affin Hwang Investment Bank Bhd (AffinHwang Capital) said with consumers taking advantage of cheaper cars in August, most passenger car players experienced stellar growth – with the exception of Perodua and Nissan.
“Proton’s car sales rose to 9,500 units in August, growing 47 per cent year on year (y-o-y) and 17 per centh month-on-month (m-o-m). Its cumulative market share for the first eight months of 2018 (8M18) market share stood at 10.6 per cent,” the firm said in a note yesterday.
“Proton’s improved sales, in tandem with the better performance of most auto players, were primarily fuelled by cheaper car prices during the zero-rated GST period.
“On the contrary, Perodua’s August sales volume fell to 17,800 units — a drop of four per cent y-o-y and 25 per cent m-o-m — due to the temporary production disruption for the Perodua Myvi (about 3,000 units were affected by vendor issues).
“As such, the 8M18 market share of the national carmakers fell to 48 per cent from 8M17 of 49.1 per cent.”
Nevertheless, AffinHwang Capital believed the dip is temporary as both players will be taking turns to roll out exciting model launches: Perodua Alza facelift, new Proton X70 and possibly an update for the Proton Iriz.
Looking at non-national carmakers, their 8M18 market share climbed to 52 per cent as among the Japanese carmakers, Mazda was the star performer for the second
time this year, with the August sales volume achieving a monthly record high of 1,900 units — a rise of 143 per cent y-o-y and 62.3 per cent m-o-m.
“We believe Mazda’s sales momentum will remain strong for the next two quarters, considering its solid bookings of 8,000 units. On the premium side, Mercedez-Benz continued to lead with 1,400 units sold, up 12 per cent y-o-y.
“Meanwhile, BMW’s car sales accelerated by 56 per cent y-o-y to 1,600 units in August. All in, the 8M18 premium car sales grew 22 per cent y-o-y.”
Looking ahead, researchers at Kenanga Investment Bank Bhd (Kenanga Research) said sales volume for September 2018 is expected to be lower than the August 2018 level with the ending of the zero-rated tax holiday.
With the new Sales and Services Tax gazetted on September 1, 2018, vehicles are charged 10 per cent sales tax.
“Nevertheless, from the recent announcement by certain car makers, the prices for the locally-assembled and Completely-Knocked-Down (CKD) units have dropped by one per cent to three per cent, whereas the prices for the Completely-Built-Up (CBU) units have increased by one per cent to three per cent,” it said in a separate report.
“We believe the unexpected price decrease in locally-assembled and CKD units was attributed to the better compliance of Industrial Linkage Programme (ILP) regulation, which provides incentives and duty exemption to the original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) that use local components (under National Automotive Policy 2014),” it added.