Automobile sales in Brazil showed growth, although this is marked by the absence of contribution from traditionally considered manufacturers. Last August, the country recorded an average daily sale of 13.1 thousand units, which represented the second-best performance of the year, only behind May, which reached 13.7 thousand units per day.
Igor Calvet, president of Anfavea, highlighted the increase in the participation of imported vehicles and the consequent decrease in the share of domestically manufactured vehicles. He observed that in the first eight months of the year, there was a positive growth of 18.4% in sales; however, production grew by only 8.5%, stating that the market is not absorbing all the potential for growth.
Between January and August of this year, the commercialization of imported passenger car and light utility models rose by 30.3%, while domestically produced vehicles registered an advance of 17.2%. Calvet detailed that out of the 148 thousand additional vehicles sold, only 47 thousand were actually produced within Brazil.
Analysis of Imported Vehicles
Of the remaining 101 thousand vehicles, the majority comes from China, arriving in partially assembled (SKD) or completely disassembled (CKD) formats, meaning they did not contribute significantly with local content. Among the ten best-selling models last month, three were Chinese: one was imported, and the other two had minimum indices of Brazilian parts, such as tires and glass. The executive did not provide forecasts on how much the Chinese models can expand in the market.
An important aspect to note is that starting in January, all imported electric vehicles, whether CKD or SKD, will be subject to a 35% Import Tax (I.I.) rate, a rate established since the 1990s. Despite this, there is still a considerable stock of BYD electric models that entered exempt from this tax.
In the international scenario, fiscal incentives have a fixed value in the local currency and are much lower than those practiced in Brazil. Additionally, Chinese exports to Argentina also caused a diversion of Brazilian vehicle sales in that neighboring country.
Even with the notable progress of electric and hybrid cars in the Brazilian market for passenger cars and light utilities (which together account for 94% of sales, with 1% remaining for buses and 5% for trucks), their presence in sales from January to August remains quite modest.
Despite the high growth percentages, these may be misleading due to excessively optimistic mathematical calculations, which could lead to premature celebrations, requiring a more cautious analysis of the overall picture.
