China Automobile Dealers Association: A brief analysis of the used car market in February 2022

Overall performance of the used car market in February 2022

In February 2022, the national used car market transaction volume was 1.0768 million vehicles, a month-on-month decrease of 27.47% and a year-on-year increase of 12.71%, with a transaction amount of 76.276 billion yuan.

Affected by the Spring Festival holiday, the number of working days in February decreased compared with January, with only 16 actual trading days, 5 days less than in January. According to traditional festival customs, most used car dealers officially resumed work after the fifteenth day of the first lunar month. Therefore, the market's customer acquisition and sales volume declined significantly in the first week after the holiday. From the third week, the source of cars and the ability to attract customers have steadily recovered. The transaction volume in February decreased by 27 percentage points month-on-month, but increased by 12.7% year-on-year compared with February 2021, and the year-on-year growth rate was significantly faster than that in January. From the perspective of the inventory of used cars, according to the survey of car dealers, the supply of cars in February was relatively sufficient, and the inventory cycle was slightly longer than that in January. Since inventory pressure occupies most of the working capital, the collection of cars in March will be affected. From the perspective of passenger flow, it is generally reflected that offline passenger flow is low.

Most car dealers are still cautious about the market outlook for March, mainly because the outbreak has spread to 19 provinces across the country, and the repeated outbreaks have led to many uncertainties in passenger and vehicle flows due to the upgrading of offline prevention and control. However, from a historical perspective, March is the beginning of the peak season, especially in economically developed regions such as Central and South China and East China, where second-hand car transactions have become active, driving the overall market towards a small spring.

Specifically, the passenger car situation in February was as follows: 640,000 basic passenger cars were traded, down 28.21% from the previous month and up 10.78% from the previous year; 138,000 SUVs were traded, down 25.96% from the previous month and up 34.58% from the previous year; 65,600 MPVs were traded, down 21.22% from the previous month and up 21.12% from the previous year; 23,900 crossover passenger cars were traded, down 27.96% from the previous month and up 12.67% from the previous year.

Commercial vehicle situation: 74,500 passenger cars, a decrease of 28.40% month-on-month and 5.50% year-on-year; 82,700 trucks, a decrease of 27.62% month-on-month and an increase of 2.75% year-on-year.

From the perspective of market characteristics, the passenger car market is still better than the commercial vehicle market. With the upgrading of automobile consumption and the opening of the national three-child policy, consumers' car demand is also changing. The SUV and MPV market segments meet the replacement needs of more consumers. After the Spring Festival, trucks, as an important means of production in the transportation industry, also saw a slight increase compared with the same period last year.

Analysis of vehicle age in used car transactions in February 2022

In February, the transaction volume of used cars with a use age of 3-6 years was the largest, accounting for 37.2%, an increase of 2.1 percentage points compared with the same period last year; the proportion of models with a use age of less than 3 years was 28.4%, an increase of 6.6 percentage points; the proportion of models with a use age of 7-10 years was 21%, a decrease of 5.5 percentage points; the proportion of models with a use age of more than 10 years was 13.4%, a decrease of 3.2 percentage points.

Analysis of the six major regions in February 2022

Second-hand car transactions in six major regions in February 2022

In February 2022, among the six major regions in China, only the Northwest region saw a year-on-year decline, while the rest of the regions saw varying degrees of growth. The most obvious growth was in the Southwest region, which increased by 20.82 percentage points year-on-year, with a second-hand car transaction volume of 180,200 vehicles; the three regions of East China, Central South, and Northeast China increased by more than 10% year-on-year, with 369,600, 295,900 and 69,000 second-hand cars traded respectively; North China increased by 7.89% year-on-year, with a second-hand car transaction volume of 117,300 vehicles; the Northwest region decreased by 11.60% year-on-year, a decrease of 12.8 percentage points from the previous month, with a second-hand car transaction volume of 47,500 vehicles.

Cross-regional circulation in 2022

In February, the transfer rate of used cars was 24.09%, an increase of 1.31 percentage points from the same period last year.