Based on estimated new-vehicle sales in Canada for the first two months of 2020, there is reason to hope that the extended sales decline, which has now lasted almost two years, may have bottomed out. At least that was the case before the worldwide impact of the coronavirus on supply lines began to take serious effect. How severely it may impact the market going forward, in terms of both supply and demand, remains to be seen.
February’s sales of 123,375 new vehicles, as estimated by DesRosiers Automotive Consultants (DAC), were up by 2.1%. from a year ago. Combined with January’s slight advance, estimated year-to-date sales of 232,991 units are 1.4% ahead of those at this point in 2019.
There are caveats on those figures. With most European and North American automakers now reporting only quarterly, total industry sales remain estimates until March results are in. In addition, as Dennis DesRosiers of DAC points out, “January and February 2019 performances were noticeably muted and not an overly difficult benchmark to overcome this year.” So those gains may not mean much.
Still, February’s SAAR (Seasonally Adjusted Annualized Sales Rate) of 2-million-plus, based on DAC’s estimates, was the best in more than 18 months. And the recent Bank of Canada rate cut should help stimulate the market,
DesRosiers notes, however, that the coronavirus outbreak and its potential economic implications raise real concerns. “Significant uncertainty remains as to how the automotive market will hold up in the critical spring sales months,” he cautions.
Passenger-car market continues to struggle
Estimated sales of 26,875 passenger cars in February brought their year-to-date market share up to 21.2% — a slight improvement from January (20.5%). But that share is down 3.7% from where it was a year ago as so-called light trucks, which include utility vehicles as well as vans and pickups, continue to dominate the market. They accounted for 78.2% of the market through February, up from 75.1% a year ago.
Volvo’s and most Japanese sales soar
Without all automakers reporting, it’s uncertain what the sales rankings for the month actually were. Of those that did report, Volvo topped the charts in terms of improvement, with its 624 sales up 17.0% from February 2019. Year-to-date, Volvo’s 1,157 sales were up 4.8% from a year ago, keeping market share at 0.5%.
Of the seven Japanese brands reporting, five made double-digit gains, with Mitsubishi’s 15.1% improvement to 2,015 units leading the way. Mitsu’s cumulative sales of 3,460 units were up 8.4%, bumping market share 0.1% to 1.5%.
Subaru sold 3,501 vehicles in February, a 14.1% gain from a year ago. The resultant 6,823 year-to-date sales were up 9.8% and market share improved by 0.2% to 2.9%.
Right behind, in terms of percentage gain, was Lexus with a 14.0% improvement to 1,650 vehicles sold. Year-to-date sales of 3,305 units were 10.7% ahead of year-ago, and market share improved 0.1% to 1.4%.
In terms of volume increase, Toyota was the biggest gainer with 13,638 sales — a 13.9% increase from February 2019. Toyota’s cumulative sales of 25,672 units were up 3.7% from last February, improving market share by 0.2% from year-ago, to 11.0%.
Mazda, too hit the double-digits with a 10.7% advance to 4,232 vehicles sold. That increase brought the Japanese brand’s year-to-date total to 7,987 sales, up 5.5% from 2019, nudging its market share up 0.1% to 3.4%.
Both Korean mainstream brands continued to make modest improvements — Kia up by 6.2% and Hyundai by 2.7%, to 4,505 and 7,503 units respectively. Both brands increased market share by 0.3%, raising Kia’s to 3.7% and Hyundai’s to 6.3%.
Nissan and Infiniti suffer declines
Nissan’s sales woes continued in February with 6,903 units sold, a decline of 10.5% from a year ago. Year-to-date sales of 13,658 vehicles were down by 9.2% and market share shrunk by 0.7% to 5.9%.
Infiniti suffered an even greater decline of 30.0%, to 589 vehicles sold in February. The resultant year-to-date total of 1,175 units was down by 22.4% and market share fell by 0.2% to 0.5%.
March will complete the first quarter of 2020 and we expect to have full sales figures from all automakers at that time.
It should be noted that the total market sales figures reported here are estimated by DAC and will be reconciled quarterly and annually, given that multiple automakers now report actual sales only on a quarterly basis. These estimated monthly results are reconciled quarterly by DAC to reflect actual sales when all companies report officially.
