Sales of new light vehicles in China will rise 8 percent to 23 million next year as the semiconductor chip crunch and other supply-chain bottlenecks ease, the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers predicted Tuesday.
With deliveries of commercial vehicles such as trucks and buses expected to contract 6 percent to 4.5 million, the overall market for new vehicles will expand 5.4 percent to 27.5 million in 2022, the industry trade group said.
Sales of electric vehicles and plug-in hybrids will remain robust, surging 47 percent to reach 5 million, CAAM added.
Separately, IHS Markit analysts on Thursday said they see the mainland China market rising 3.3 percent to 24.2 million next year, with more meaningful recovery expected for 2023 — or back above pre-crisis levels to 26.9 million, and rising 11.3 percent from 2022 to 2023.
With one month to go, 2021 light-vehicle sales industrywide will increase 5.6 percent to 21.3 million while commercial-vehicle deliveries will drop 6.4 percent to 4.8 million, according to the group.
EV and plug-in hybrid sales this year will reach 3.4 million, a 150-percent jump from a year earlier.
China’s total new-vehicle sales in 2021 are on track to edge up 3.1 percent to 26.1 million — well below the forecast of 6 percent to 7 percent the group made in July.
CAAM blamed the lower-than-expected market expansion on persistent tight chip supplies, which it estimates resulted in a loss of 1.3 million to 1.4 million units of annual sales.