Our take on the latest Car registrations (Tue 6 Oct 2020)
Total car registrations down 18%pa
Total car registrations excluding rentals down 7.0%pa
New car registrations down 25%pa
The key numbers...
- Passenger car registrations totalled 18,074 in September, down by 18%pa, leaving car registrations for the September quarter down 14%pa.
- New car registrations slumped 25%pa in September, which was significantly larger than the 11%pa decline recorded by used car registrations.
- Rental car registrations were down 93%pa and are down 94%pa since April.
- The lack of rental car registrations is weighing on the total registrations, especially for new cars. However, excluding rentals, new car registrations were down only 1.8%pa.
Changes in new car registrations
3 month annual % changes
...and our reaction
- Besides rental cars, registrations held up well over the September quarter, with activity boosted by savings that people accrued during lockdown.
- However, the post-lockdown sugar rush didn’t last long, with August and September recording weak registration numbers for both new and used cars.
- Nearly 13,000 rental cars were registered between September 2019 and December 2019. The build-up to summer usually marks the busiest time of year, but we will only see a fraction of last year’s rental registrations during 2020.
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