After declining for 3 months, PV sales up marginally in Oct
NEW DELHI: Domestic passenger vehicle sales rose 1.55% in October, snapping three months of consecutive decline, although low market sentiments affected festive season demand, Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers (Siam) said on Friday.
According to the latest data released by Siam, passenger vehicle (PV) sales in October stood at 284,224 units as against 279,877 units in the year-ago month.
In July, August and September PV sales have declined by 2.71%, 2.46% and 5.61%, respectively.
Siam director general, Vishnu Mathur, said positive growth in PV sales witnessed in October is reflective of the overall trend in the automobile industry.
Overall, the data shows pretty healthy growth. There is a positive movement in the automobile industry, he said.
Vehicle sales across categories registered a growth of 15.33% to 2,494,426 units from 2,162,869 units in October 2017.
On PVS, Mathur said, “The slow growth is mainly due to base effect besides other factors such as increase in insurance, high fuel prices and decline in stock market impacting sentiments.”
When asked if those factors affected festive mood, Mathur said, “The real impact of festive sales will be known only next month as Diwali was in November this year. However, till the end of October, sales have been slow and it wasn’t like festive season.”
He, however, said Siam was maintaining its growth forecast for PVS at 7-9% for the fiscal.
In the April-october period this fiscal, total PV sales have grown by 6.10% to 2,028,529 units as against 1,911,883 units in the year-ago period, Siam said.
Siam deputy director general, Sugato Sen, said October PV sales were as per expectations and going forward the industry body expects it to pick up further in the remaining part of the fiscal.
During the month, market leader Maruti Suzuki India posted a marginal growth of 0.61% in PV sales at 1,35,948 units. Rival Hyundai Motor India also posted 4.87% increase at 52,001 units. Homegrown utility vehicle major Mahindra & Mahindra posted 2.75% increase in its PV sales at 24,056 units in October.
In October, car sales grew marginally by 0.38% to 1,85,400 units last month as against 184,706 units in the same month last year.
Siam said total two-wheeler sales in October were up 17.23% to 20,53,497 units as against 1,751,608 units in the year-ago month.
The growth was mainly on the back of good motorcycle sales, which increased 20.14% last month to 1,327,758 units compared to 1,105,140 units in October 2017.