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Carsales Staff3 Sept 2015
NEWS

August VFACTS: Hyundai overtakes Holden

Korean brand passes Holden in 2015 sales race as Toyota falters at the top

First it was Mazda and now Hyundai has overtaken Holden for second spot behind Toyota on the 2015 sales chart, in what appears increasingly likely to be the Australian car industry's new pecking order.

The Korean brand has topped Holden for monthly sales before, but according to official VFACTS figures to be released tomorrow it also eclipsed the once dominant local car-maker for year-to-date sales for the first time in August.

The result sees Hyundai, which sold 9505 vehicles last month (up 10.5 per cent) to notch up 68,115 registrations so far this year (up 2.4%), hit the top three for YTD sales for the time since it arrived in Australia in 1986.

Meantime Holden, which sold 7870 vehicles last month (down 8.9%) and 67,502 YTD -- down 9.3% and 613 sales behind Hyundai), has slipped outside the top three for YTD sales for the first time since 1948.

The only bright spots for Holden last month were the Ute, the Barina Spark micro and the Captiva 5 and Colorado 7 SUVs, as all other models declined including the Commodore, which found 2144 buyers to be down 15 per cent YTD.

Despite big sales slumps for the i20, i30 and i40 last month, booming sales of the iLoad, Elantra, Santa Fe and ix35 (which was in run-out ahead of the new Tucson's release, finding almost as many buyers as the Mazda CX-5) pushed Hyundai sales higher.

According to News Corp, the Korean brand has increased its sales targets for the remainder of this year in markets including Australia to offset slower sales in China, so it could widen its lead over Holden.

Now well entrenched in second is Mazda, which spiked by 21.7 per cent last month to be up 11.3 per cent YTD, with a record 9.9 per cent market share.

This was despite the continued sales slide of it top-selling model – the Mazda3 – which was again outsold by the Toyota Corolla in the battle for Australia's most popular new car, and thanks largely to the new CX-3 (1595 sales), a 20 per cent boom in CX-5 sales (1980, again making it the top-selling SUV) and run-out sales of the BT-50 4x4.

Market leader Toyota was down 7.2 per cent in August, courtesy of sales decreases by all key models except the Yaris, Camry and RAV4, with the once-dominant HiLux outsold by the Ford Ranger and Mitsubishi Triton and placing just 10th overall as its replacement nears.

YTD, the world's top car-maker now lies 170 sales behind its 2014 result, in a total market that climbed another 2.9 per cent last month to be 3.2 per cent up in 2015, when cumulative sales of 761, 440 keeps the industry well on target for another million market with four months to go.

Once again the growth was fuelled by 4x4 utes and all SUV segments, which collectively were up almost 20 per cent last month, while passenger car sales fell 4.6 per cent to remain 3.4 per cent down YTD, the only exceptions being light, medium and people-mover.

While Ford was down a big 22.5 per cent last month, Jeep was down another 35 per cent and Nissan sales remained 7.7 per cent slower.

But posting strong August sales were Kia (up 50%), Volkswagen (+17.9%), Honda (+16.3%), Subaru (+15.9%), Suzuki (+9.6%) and Mitsubishi (+6.5%).

Of the luxury brands, Mercedes-Benz continues to soar – up more than 25 per cent in August -- thanks to the B-Class (+29%), C-Class (+72%), C-Class Coupe (+162%), CLA-Class (+54%) and GLA-Class (+121%) – to remain more than 20 per cent ahead YTD.

Excluding commercials, Benz was actually 33 percent ahead last month, when it sold almost 3000 vehicles -- more than Ford, Nissan, Subaru, Honda, Mitsubishi, Kia and Suzuki.

With 20,577 registrations YTD (up 23%) and AMGs accounting for 13 per cent of its car and SUV sales, Mercedes extended its lead over the other two Germans and continues to vie with Kia to be in the top 10 best-selling brands overall.

Meantime, BMW was also up – by 9.7% -- in August to be 13.9 per cent ahead YTD with 16,845 sales, while Audi was up a big 20.5 per cent last month to remain 17.5 per cent ahead YTD with 15,004 regos.

Merc's only key passenger car lowlights were the A-Class (17% down and outsold by the Audi A3 and BMW 1 Series), the E-Class 40+% down and outsold by the BMW 5 Series) and M-Class (which was down 25% and again outsold by the BMW X5 as the GLE nears).

August Top 10 models:
Toyota Corolla – 3050
Mazda3 – 2673
Holden Commodore – 2144
Hyundai i30 – 2098
Ford Ranger – 2096
Toyota Camry – 2095
Mitsubishi Triton – 1991
Mazda CX-5 -- 1980
Hyundai ix35 – 1967
Toyota HiLux – 1956

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Written byCarsales Staff
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