Automotive News Indonesia: Modest Car Sales Growth in October

So far this year (January-October 2017), a total of 898,218 cars have been sold in Indonesia, the largest car market in Southeast Asia. The figure is only a modest 2.5 percent (y/y) increase from the nation's car sales figure in the same period one year earlier, hence Gaikindo's full-year 2017 car sales target may not be achieved.

Gaikindo targets to see 1.1 million car sales in Indonesia in full-year 2017. This would imply a 4 percent jump from car sales in 2016 (when a total of 1,061,859 car units were sold). More likely, Indonesian car sales will reach a figure of 1.07 million at the year-end.

Meanwhile, in the ASEAN region, car sales have risen at a higher pace in the third quarter of 2017. According to data from the ASEAN Automotive Federation, car sales in this region rose 5.8 percent (y/y) to 821,573 units in July-September 2017. The rise was attributed to an improving economy and stable politics in the ASEAN region. These factors managed to boost consumer confidence, hence resulting in rising car sales. The launch of new car models may also have contributed.

Within ASEAN, Indonesia is the biggest car market, followed by Thailand and Malaysia. However, in terms of production, Thailand is the clear leading nation within ASEAN.

Yohannes Nangoi, General Chairman of Gaikindo, said there is still ample room for long-term growth of the car industry in Indonesia as the nation's per capita car ownership figure is very low. Currently, only eight out of every 100 Indonesians own a car (versus a 24:100 ratio in Thailand and 40:100 ratio in Malaysia). Provided per capita GDP continues to rise, then there should emerge rapidly rising demand for cars in the future.

Read more: Overview & Analysis of Indonesia's Automotive Industry

Meanwhile, Indonesia's installed annual car production capacity now stands between 2.0 - 2.2 million vehicles. Considering only around 1.1 million cars are sold domestically, while only around 200,000 cars are exported from Indonesia, these automotive plants in Indonesia cannot work at full capacity yet.

Indonesian Car Sales (CBU):

Month	Sold Cars    2013	Sold Cars    2014	Sold Cars    2015	Sold Cars    2016	Sold Cars    2017
January	96,718	103,609	94,194	85,002	86,324
February	103,278	111,824	88,740	88,208	95,159
March	95,996	113,067	99,410	94,092	102,336
April	102,257	106,124	81,600	84,770	89,623
May	99,697	96,872	79,375	88,567	94,091
June	104,268	110,614	82,172	91,488	66,370
July	112,178	91,334	55,615	61,891	84,905
August	77,964	96,652	90,537	96,282	96,466
September	115,974	102,572	93,038	92,541	87,645
October	112,039	105,222	88,408	92,106	94,461
November	111,841	91,327	86,938	100,365
December	97,706	78,802	73,264	86,547
Total	1,229,916	1,208,019	1,013,291	1,061,859

^{Source: Gaikindo}

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