Brazil new-car sales highest ever in June
Wed Jul 1, 2009 1:43pm EDT
By Alberto Alerigi Jr
SAO PAULO, July 1 (Reuters) - Brazilian motorists bought more new cars in June than any previous month in history, scoffing at the country's recession and driving around 290,000 cars from the showrooms, an industry source said on Wednesday.
The government has twice renewed a tax break that suspends sales taxes on one-liter engined cars and reduces it for larger capacity models, keeping sales buoyant even through the worst of the recent downturn.
The cut, introduced last December, lowered showroom prices about 10 percent and was extended this week for three more months, making Brazil one of the few bright spots for the global auto industry.
General Motors (GMGMQ.PK), whose Chevrolet brand is one of the most popular in the Latin American nation of 190 million people, said it sold more cars in June than at any other time in its 84-year presence in Brazil.
Fiat (FIA.MI) and Volkswagen (VOWG.DE) are the biggest automakers in Brazil in terms of sales, followed by GM and then Ford (F.N).
According to the source with preliminary access to data on new registrations of cars and light commercial vehicles, sales in June totaled 289,985 units, beating the previous record of 288,100 in July last year.
Around 237,000 cars and light commercial vehicles were sold in May and the total figure for the first half of the year was 1.39 million, compared with 1.34 million in the same period last year when the economy was still in growth.
Automotive sector analyst Alexandre Andrade from the Tendencias consultancy in Sao Paulo, said sales had grown in response to the tax cut but also because financing had become easier to obtain for longer periods.
Jackson Schneider, chairman of the Anfavea association of automobile manufacturers in Brazil, has said 2009 could be the best year in history, surpassing record sales in 2008.
The association may be led to revise a forecast of a 3.9 percent fall in sales to 2.7 million units for 2009 and an 11 percent drop in production to 2.86 million units. (Writing by Peter Murphy; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)
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