Shanghai (ZXZC)- China's Vehicle Inventory Alert Index (VIA) stood at 52.2% in February 2021, which dropped 7.0 percentage points compared to the previous month and plunged 29 percentage points over the previous year, while the figure was still above the official warning threshold, according to the China Automobile Dealers Association (CADA).

The year-on-year decrease in VIA was mainly credited to the low base for the year-ago period, which resulted from the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, said the CADA.

China's car consumption entered the off-season in February. Since the Chinese New Year fell in the mid-February, the car shopping demands still maintained a rising movement in the first week, while shrank during the holiday because many migrant works decided to celebrate the Spring Festival at where they work rather than returning to their hometowns.

Compared to the corresponding period in 2019, the car sales in February 2021 are expected to show increase, said the CADA.

The inventory pressure confronting dealers was somewhat decreased in February as they faced lower car wholesale task set by OEMs in the slack season.

The VIAs of the imported & luxury brands, the mainstream joint-venture brands and the Chinese indigenous brands amounted to 50.6%, 52.9% and 51.7% last month, dipping 5.8, 6.5 and 9.4 percentage points over a month ago respectively.

The association also noted the car sales are expected to rise in March as many local governments will keep implementing incentives and the springtime auto shows are to be hosted to boost car shopping.