August auto sales over 1.2 million units sold. Energy saving vehicles see sales incease.

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For those of us that drive in China on a daily basis, we’re really starting to feel that China really is moving over 1.2 million units per month off the dealership lots, traffic is crawling to a halt in many places and traffic jams of over 30km are starting to happen. August car sales reached 12.155 million cars sold in total across China, an increase of 15.9% over weaker sales in July and a large increase of 55.72% over August 2009 sales.

New energy vehicles appeared to be the big new winners thanks to government support, 32 energy saving vehicles achieved total sales of 129,600 vehicles, an increase of 32.04% over July sales and accounted for 13.26% of total car sales in August, whilst small displacement engines of 1.6L or less accounted for 19.88% of the market.

Domestic self developed vehicles fell slightly in August with 176,400 vehicles sold which is an increase of 16.60% over the previous year. Japanese cars stood at 176,100 cars (an increase of 26.98%) whilst European cars sold 174,200 cars (an increase of 16.89%).

For many years it has seemed that sedans were the most popular form of automobile for the Chinese market, but now it looks like hatchbacks are coming into fashion but sedans are still keeping their advantage. Sedans stood for 548,000 cars, an increase of 20.90% over July and a year on year increase of 50.59%. Hatchbacks sold 149,200 vehicles, an increase of 17.06% and a year on year increase of 84.63%, this shows that hatchbacks are starting to gain some ground in the Chinese market.

Vehicles with automatic gearboxes sold 329,600 in total, and stood for 47.27% of all vehicles sold, with the most popular models being 4, 5, and 6 speed vehicles and includes CVT and AMT equipped cars.

SUV’s are still continuing to be a popular style of car for Chinese consumers with production reaching 94,300 vehicles in August, but this was a decrease of 3.72% over July production whilst sales stood at 87,500 vehicles an increase of 13.75% over July sales and an increase of 117.13% over August 2009 sales. Interestingly, two wheel drive SUV’s sold 33,500 vehicles, an increase of 17.03% and stood for 38.32% of all SUV’s sold in August. AWD SUV’s sold 54,000 vehicles, an increase of 11.81% over July and took 61.68% of the market.

August’s MPV sales stood steady at 38,500 MPV’s sold, a slight decrease of 0.02% over July but an increase of 64.41% on August 2009′s sales stats. Four cylinder MPV’s were the most popular with 2.0l, 2.4l and 1.8l MPV’s taking the larger portion of the market.