New vehicle sales increase in February, but experts predict disruption of global supply chains in new vehicles
A total of 883 vehicles were sold during February 2022, compared to the 705 units sold in January and 893 in February 2021, according to the National Association of Automobile Manufacturers South Africa.
Vehicle sales decreased by 1.1% on an annual basis and increased by 25.2% month on month for January and February 2022. Almost half of all the February sales is passenger vehicles with bakkies and other light commercial vehicles constituted 41.4$ of sales.
The lion’s share of the February market was split between Toyota (45.8%), Volkswagen (8.5%), Ford (5%), KIA (4.9%) and Nissan (also 4.9%).
“Vehicle sales moved above the 6-month moving average and we maintain our view that vehicle sales will be marginally positive from 2021 as a result of high local demand but constrained by the foreign supply of new vehicles,” Simonis Storm Securities economist, Theo Klein said.
Klein warned that the invasion of Ukraine will disrupt global supply chains of new vehicles and disrupt the production of electric chips. While the South African Rand has held its ground year to date, Klein believes that Namibian consumers should be prepared for additional new vehicle price hikes in 2022.
“Local dealerships will likely continue to struggle in sourcing new stock, maintaining a limit on new vehicle sales growth. The local market can still be characterised by demand exceeding supply, indicating that vehicle sales would be higher in the absence of global vehicle manufacturing limitations, despite the prospect of rising interest rates,” Klein said.
