Shanghai (ZXZC)- Four major Japanese automakers have released their China market's sales performance in the so-called “silver October”, the traditional peak season for car sales in this country. However, three of them, including Toyota, Nissan and Mazda, all failed to achieve increase compared with the year-ago period.

Toyota

Last month, Toyota came across its second-time year-on-year drop in China retail sales so far this year.

Toyota said its auto deliveries in China (including sales of Lexus-branded cars) slid 2.9% from a year ago to 131,700 units in October. Based on figures collected by ZXZC previously, the growth in year-to-date sales should be around 8%.

（Photo source: FAW Toyota)

FAW Toyota put the all-new RAV4 onto the market in late October, while consumers’ wait-and-see mood prior to the model’s launch was linked to the monthly sales downturn.

Lexus, the Toyota-owned premium car brand, saw its China sales jump 11.2% from a year ago to 16,324 units. After ten months through October, the brand had sold 160,914 vehicles in China, an impressive growth of 21.5%.

With 5,690 units sold, hybrid models accounted for 34.9% of total Lexus’ China sales in October, 3.3 percentage points more than that of September.

Honda

Honda has been achieving year-on-year growth in China retail sales for eight consecutive months as of October, 2019.

The Japanese automaker said it delivered 147,716 vehicles last month in the world's largest auto market, up by 6.5% from a year ago. Both joint ventures gained rising performance as well—GAC Honda saw its deliveries edge up 1.1% to 67,992 units, while Dongfeng Honda boasted a double-digit increase of 11.6% with 79,724 vehicles sold.

（Photo source: Honda)

In October, there were a total of six models whose respective deliveries all exceeded 10,000 units, namely, the Accord, the Crider, the Vezel, the Civic, the CR-V and XR-V, according to Honda's China branch. Notably, the Civic got its retail sales exceeding 20,000 units for five straight months.

Besides, the combined sales of the hybrid models of the Accord, the Odyssey, the CR-V, the Inspire and the Elysion amounted to 15,373 units, jumping 15.85% compared with the previous month.

Nissan

Nissan said its China deliveries for the first ten months of 2019 totaled 1,230,047 units, edging down 0.6%, while still outpacing the overall auto market.

The passenger vehicle business arm—Dongfeng Nissan and Dongfeng Venucia—sold 1,023,922 units through October, facing a slight drop of 0.8%. Of that, Dongfeng Nissan, selling 926,225 vehicles, achieving its highest-ever Jan.-Oct. sales volume.

Additionally, the light commercial vehicle business units—Dongfeng Automobile Co.,Ltd (DFAC) and Zhengzhou Nissan—sold 174,573 vehicles from January to October, posting an increase of 3% from a year earlier. 

（Photo source: Dongfeng Nissan)

As for Oct. performance, Nissan saw its China sales dip 2.1% to 139,064 units. Dongfeng Nissan (including imported Nissan-branded models)'s sales edged up 1% to 108,026 units with several models clocking evident growth. Sales volume of the seven-generation ALTIMA, the Sylphy and the TIIDA reached 10,130 units (+3%), 42,568 units (+6.3%) and 7,645 units (+31%). Besides, 18,406 Qashqai cars were sold last month, the best-ever Oct. figure for the model.

Mazda

In October, 2019, Mazda delivered 19,882 vehicles in China, a year-on-year drop of 9.1%, according to the figures offered by Mazda Motor (China) Co., Ltd.

The automaker said FAW Mazda's and Changan Mazda's retail sales reached 8,526 units and 11,356 units respectively. Based on the data for the year-ago period, we found out that the former gained a growth of 5.2%, while the latter’s deliveries fell roughly 17.6%.

For the first ten months, 181,624 consumers in China took delivery of Mazda's vehicles, shrinking 21.9% over a year earlier. Of that, FAW Mazda sold 71,977 vehicles (-22.1%) and Changan Mazda contributed 109,647 vehicles to the sales with a year-on-year decline of 21.8%.

（Photo source: Changan Mazda)

With 8,756 vehicles delivered in October, the Mazda3 Axela was still the best-seller. Besides, the deliveries of the Mazda6 Atenza, the CX-4 and the CX-5 were 4,046 units, 4,480 units and 2,486 units.

As to year-to-date sales, 77,256 consumers took delivery of the hottest-selling Mazda3 Axela. In addition, retail sales of the other three models totaled 102,084 units.