The Russian car market was left with virtually no new deliveries of foreign brands of cars, and also faced a new wave of declining demand against the backdrop of military mobilization. Under such conditions, the market finally ended up in the possession of Russian and Chinese brands. This is stated in the report of the Association of European Businesses (AEB), whichdrew attention to Kommersant.
According to the results of the first three quarters of 2022, the Russian automotive market has collapsed by almost 60%. Most companies do not replenish their warehouses and sell the last leftovers, which is why Chinese brands have become leaders, and the Russian Lada has become the most popular brand. Sales of Korean KIA and Huyndai, popular before the war, collapsed by more than 60%, while European Volkswagen and Skoda generally flew out of the leaders, losing ground to Chinese companies.
According to the results of nine months, the market collapsed by 59.8%, to 506.7 thousand cars sold, by the end of September – by 59.6%, to 46.7 thousand units. Russian AvtoVAZ remains the market leader and even increased sales in September by 20% to 20.6 thousand units. The greatest demand is for Lada Granta, which, according to experts, has remained practically the only budget option on the Russian market. In September, the company was able to immediately sell 13.4 thousand cars of this model.
The second place in terms of sales according to the results of three quarters is occupied by KIA (-64%, up to 56.8 thousand cars), the third with almost the same dynamics of sales decline is occupied by Huyndai (-62%, up to 49.9 thousand). The top 5 also includes Renault (-67%, up to 32.9 thousand) and the Russian concern GAZ (-35%, up to 25.4 thousand). In addition to Lada, only the Chinese Changan (+74%, to 789 cars) showed positive dynamics in monthly terms, the rest of the "Chinese" faced a drop in sales: Haval (-2%, to 3.4 thousand cars) and Geely (-4% , up to 2.5 thousand pieces).
Hyundai became a foreign car in September, however, the main sales were not in the traditionally popular Solaris, but in the crossovers Tucson (1.6 thousand), Santa Fe and Creta (0.6 thousand each). At KIA, on the contrary, Rio is still the most popular brand, but its sales have collapsed by more than 10 times to 600 units over the year. Renault sold 1.3 thousand cars in September (-82%), Volkswagen – only 758 cars. There were no Japanese brands in the top 10 most popular brands of September.
After the start of the war in Ukraine, almost all foreign brands left Russia. Chinese companies that did not announce their intention to leave the Russian market could well occupy empty niches, but did not do so, as the risks turned out to be too high, and the Russian market was simply unpromising.