Thai H1 2018 car sales up 19.3%, production up 11.1%

The Federation of Thai Industries (FTI) has an optimistic outlook for the country’s automotive industry, the Bangkok Post reports. This is as the country posted growth in production, domestic sales and exports in the first half of 2018.

Last week, the FTI’s automotive industry club reported strong performance in June, where production increased 7.7% to 188,970 units, buoyed by pick-up trucks for exports.

“The export outlook has performed better than expected as the country’s main destination, the Middle East, has resumed economic growth on rising oil prices,” said spokesman Surapong Paisitpatanapong. Domestic sales in June jumped 25.9% to 87,854 units, up 3.4% month-on-month.

Thai H1 2018 car sales up 19.3%, production up 11.1%

Boosted by June figures, total production in the first half of 2018 is up 11.1% year-on-year to 1.057 million vehicles. Car sales in Thailand ended H1 2018 with 489,118 units, which is 19.3% y-o-y growth. Exports grew 4.8% in the first six months of the year to 561,960 units, valued at 290.892 billion baht (+2.6%).

Despite the stronger than expected performance so far, the auto industry club is yet to officially revise upwards the projections for the full year, and will make a final decision this week. The tentative full year 2018 projection is 2.1 million total production (from 2m), domestic sales of 960,000-980,000 (from 900k) and exports of 1.12 million (from 1.1m).

The strong showing is attributed to factors such as government spending, private sector investment, new car models, growing consumer confidence, an uptick in the construction sector, recovery in farm output prices, healthy imports/exports, poverty reduction measures and a bullish tourism sector.

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