21st Century Business Herald reporter Du Qiaomei Beijing reported that "the shortage of chips in 2021 is a situation that the domestic car market has never encountered in so many years of development." In 2022, the impact of chips will gradually weaken, which will help boost the car market and return the overall domestic car market to the normal development track. A few days ago, Qiu Kai, director of the Industrial Coordination Department of the China Automobile Dealers Association, said at the monthly situation analysis meeting.
Looking back at 2021, although the epidemic situation has improved, the chip shortage has run through the whole year. The auto market recovered steadily in the first quarter; the chip shortage in the second quarter began to affect the supply of automobiles, and the market trend gradually weakened; the chip problem reached its peak in the third quarter, and the sharp reduction in production of automobile manufacturers affected the terminal market; the lack of core in the fourth quarter eased, the automobile supply tended to be stable, and the market performance was slightly better than that in the third quarter.
The China Automobile Dealers Association expects car sales to be about 25.8 million units in 2021, basically the same as in 2020, and passenger car sales are about 21 million units, compared with 20 million units last year, with only a slight increase of less than 5%.
At the same time, under the influence of chip shortage, the dealer inventory warning index in 2021 is closer to the boom-bust line in all months than in 2020, but this does not mean that the market has reached the ideal level, and the overall operating conditions of dealers are basically flat compared with 2020, or slightly down.
"Since the second half of 2020, the shortage of chips has caused a shortage of main sales models, the second reason is that the overall epidemic situation in 2021 has shown a multi-point distribution trend, which has affected the normal operation of dealers to a certain extent, and the third reason is that there is downward pressure on the overall economy, the income recovery of residents is not ideal, and the consumption capacity is insufficient, which has a certain impact on the dealers' collection and transactions." Qiu Kai said.
Demand in the auto market was insufficient, and sales in December fell year-on-year
A few days ago, the latest issue of the "China Automobile Dealers Inventory Alert Index Survey" VIA (Vehicle Inventory Alert Index) released by the China Automobile Dealers Association shows that the inventory warning index of automobile dealers in December 2021 was 56.1%, down 4.6 percentage points year-on-year and up 0.7 percentage points month-on-month, and the inventory early warning index was above the boom-bust line.
In the case of a easing of the supply of raw materials such as chips, the supply side of automobiles continues to improve. This year's dealer impulse is less than in previous years, the marketing efforts of double twelve and Christmas, auto shows and other activities are not large, and consumers' enthusiasm for buying cars at the end of the year is not high. At the same time, the outbreak of the epidemic in many places and the promotion of local New Year, the obstruction of returning home before the holiday further affected the release of demand in the peak season.
Dealers actively stock up for the peak sales season, and the further recovery of inventory has also brought certain financial pressure. Problems such as the shortage of hot-selling models and the long pick-up cycle still exist. At the same time, the epidemic prevention and control has been tightened, the weather is cold, and consumers have reduced their purchase of cars in stores, which has a certain impact on sales. It is difficult to have a "tail tail" effect in December, and sales of full-caliber passenger cars are expected to be about 2.1 million units in December, up about 18% from November.
From the demand side, the automobile consumption index in December 2021 was 71.4, a slight decline compared with November; from the sub-index that constitutes the automobile consumption index, the demand sub-index in December 2021 was 78.6, a slight decline from the previous month.
The association analysis pointed out that since the beginning of winter, with the further reduction of temperature, the increase in ice and snow weather and the repeated epidemics in many places, although the shopping season is close to the end of the year, compared with previous years, consumers' willingness to enter the store has not increased significantly. At the same time, the overall economic outlook is uncertain, consumer confidence has declined and dealer promotions at the end of the year are weaker than in previous years, and consumers' enthusiasm for car purchases is not high.
"Sales in December 2021 are expected to be around 2.1 million units, up about 18% month-on-month, but down more than 20% from the level of 2.7 million units in December 2020." Qiu Kai said.
In addition, the association expects that the market demand in January this year will not fluctuate much compared with December.
The "lack of core" eased, and the market price fell
"With the gradual stabilization of the overseas epidemic, the shortage of chips has gradually eased, production has gradually recovered, and wholesale volume has rebounded, but the terminal volume is still affected, the pace of recovery is relatively slow, and sales are showing a downward trend." It is expected that with the gradual decline in chip supply tension, terminal retail will gradually recover. Chang Liang, secretary general of the Travel Branch of the China Automobile Dealers Association, said that with the recovery of chip supply, wholesale volume has gradually rebounded in the past two months, dealers' inventories have risen, and market prices have gradually declined.
According to the "December 2021 Market Insight and Price Monthly Report" (hereinafter referred to as the "Report") released by the China Automobile Dealers Association and Guangzhou Wilson Information Technology Co., Ltd., the overall market price index in December was 99.1%, down 0.5% from the previous month, and the discount rate was 7.7%, up 0.6% from the previous month.
However, the production capacity of head manufacturers such as Volkswagen, Honda, and Toyota is still greatly affected, sales continue to decline, and the lack of core is still the biggest obstacle to the rise of the joint venture market in the short term.
At the same time, the independent market will continue to maintain an upward trend in the short term in the future, but the growth rate will gradually slow down. Independent brands are less affected by the lack of cores, in December 2021, the main manufacturers continued to have ideal performance, new energy models maintained a strong upward trend, in order to further seize the market, dealers stabilized the output of preferential discounts, the price index rose slightly by 0.1% month-on-month, and the discount rate fell slightly by 0.1%.
The independent brand industry chain has a strong ability to cope with chip shortages, effectively resolving the pressure of chip shortage, and the strong growth of new energy models has also brought considerable increments, SAIC-GM-Wuling, BYD, GAC E-An, Ideal, etc. have achieved rapid growth; in addition, the head brands Changan and Hongqi have also made great progress to jointly promote the rise of the independent market.
In addition, the production and supply situation in the luxury market has improved, and the sales volume of the segment will pick up. In November, the consumption environment of the luxury car market was stable, the impact of chips still existed but the production and supply situation improved, but the overall recovery rhythm was still relatively slow, with retail sales of 263,000 in November, down 23.5% year-on-year. The lack of production capacity caused by the lack of cores has also led to a decline in the luxury market, which has continued to be in demand in recent years, and many hot-selling models, including BBA, have risen weakly. It is expected that with the gradual improvement of the chip shortage problem, superimposed on the positive sales at the end of the year and before the Spring Festival, the sales volume of the segment will rebound in the future, and the desired growth will be achieved in December, but it is still showing a downward trend year-on-year.
From the perspective of production and marketing, the impact of the epidemic on domestic industrial production is relatively weak. The pace of purchase and sales of major manufacturers is still affected by chips. The impact of the epidemic abroad is still serious, and the supply of imported cars has eased slightly.
From the price trend point of view, the preferential margin of the luxury car market has increased compared with last month, although it is still affected by the shortage of chips, but the manufacturers have achieved sales targets to complete the sales task and allocated more resources to December, and the prices of some main sales models have begun to fall. From the price index, the overall luxury market fell by 1.8%.
In the domestic luxury car market, near the end of the year, manufacturers carry out more promotional activities to attract consumers into the store, and the overall discount begins to increase in anticipation of greater sales and orders. From the price index, the overall market fell by 2.4%.
In the imported luxury car market, the demand in December 2021 is relatively stable, the car source is relatively tight, and the price increase of some imported cars has increased.
"This year's independent brands performed the best, with positive growth both month-on-month and year-on-year, an increase of 25 percentage points compared with the 2019 data." Finally, the association said that from the perspective of cumulative sales, luxury and independent brands have achieved positive growth, and only joint venture brands have declined. The growth of luxury brands is mainly because the automobile market has entered the era of stock, whether it is exchange or additional purchase, automobile consumption upgrades are the main force for the sales growth of luxury brands. Independent brand sales growth rate increased, in addition to independent brand products by more and more consumers recognized, there are new energy vehicles in the past two years of sales growth driven, China's sales of new energy vehicles are mostly independent brands, so the growth of new energy vehicle sales has also led to the overall sales of independent brands.