Local cumulative number of new vehicle sales declines despite an increase in sales in February
Despite the fact that the number of new vehicles sold in Namibia during February is higher than the number sold in the prior two months, the cumulative number of new vehicles sold continues to decline on a rolling 12-month basis, and is trending at the lowest level in ten years.
This is according to latest statistics made available by the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers of South Africa, which show that 799 new vehicles were sold in Namibia during February, an increase of 19.1% from the 671 vehicles sold in January, and a 6.4% y/y increase from the 751 new vehicles sold in February 2019.
Two months into 2020 and 1470 new vehicles have been sold, of which 638 were passenger vehicles, 721 light commercial vehicles, and 111 medium and heavy commercial vehicles. The first two months of 2019 saw 1,429 new vehicles sold.
IJG Research is of the view that the downward trend in vehicle sales is likely to continue for the rest of the year as there are no indicators that economic conditions will improve substantially any time soon.
“Historical data indicates that new vehicle sales typically pick-up somewhat in March, however we are of the view that the increase in sales for the month will be relatively small. Recent new vehicle sales figures suggest that vehicle owners are either holding on to the vehicles they already own or purchasing second hand and imported vehicles,” IJG noted.
During February, Toyota (29.6%) overtook Volkswagen (28.8%) in terms of year-to-date market share of new passenger vehicles sold in the country. They were followed by Kia and Hyundai with 7.8% and 6.4% of the market respectively, while the rest of the passenger vehicle market was shared by several other competitors.
