Winners and losers: Brands close the books on 2017-18 new car sales

JAPANESE car makers have made huge inroads into the Australian new-car market over the last 12 months, results for the 2017-18 financial year show.

Honda, Mitsubishi, Isuzu and Subaru have all shown the biggest gains compared with the 2016-17 financial year, with the market overall eclipsing the 2017 calendar year’s record 1,189,116 sales to close the books with 1,195,086 sales, 4.9 percent ahead of the calendar year’s result. Kia has also had a strong fiscal year, nudging 60,000 sales.

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With the winners come the losers. Brands losing significant ground in the 12 months up to June 30, 2018 include Fiat, Ford, Holden, Infiniti, Jeep, Jaguar, Nissan and Porsche.

The strong result for the 2017-18 financial year comes on the back of two straight months of soft decline for the market to June, but on the back of a strong finish to 2017.

Market giant Toyota finished the year relatively flat, posting a 219,394 sales result for the 12-month period, a fall of 1.4 percent. Mazda placed second, claiming 114,197 sales for the period, a fall of 3.8 percent over the previous financial year’s result.

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Hyundai, which remained flat with only a 0.1 percent gain, logged 97,137 sales, still short of the psychological 100,000 glass ceiling. Making Hyundai uneasy is Mitsubishi, which has risen 12 percent over the last 12 months with 84,852 sales.

Holden’s woes since the start of this year are masked by the rush to buy the last of the locally made Holden Commodores, which created a sales spike for the brand in the last half of 2017. It slotted in at fifth, with its worst result on record in early 2018 contributing to an 8.6 percent slide to 80,807 sales, but enough to keep it ahead of sixth-placed Ford with 73,889 sales.

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Forget Dieselgate. Volkswagen made a 4.4 percent gain in the 2017-18 financial year to close with 58,344 sales, with Kia placed in eighth with 57,350 sales and a hugely impressive 14.4 percent kick.

Nissan had a tough 12 months, losing 11.2 percent of the previous year’s sales to close the books with 56,141 buyers on its books, good enough to place it ninth. Snapping on its heels is Honda, which has made a 26 percent gain fiscal year-on-year. It wasn’t far behind its Japanese rival on 54,253 sales.

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In terms of the luxury brands, Merc’s figures are a bit of a mess to figure out as it has spun out the numbers for its commercial vehicles division separately from its passenger car range. But both Audi (21,933 sales) and BMW (23,685) have struggled to improve their form, falling 3.8 percent and 5.7 percent respectively. Lexus, meanwhile, has wobbled around 8088 sales, a 1.6 percent fall compared with 2016-17.

Last financial year was a cracking one to be in Ferrari sales. The brand finished the year 15.6 percent up, with a total of 230 cars making their way into buyers’ garages – that’s more than Chrysler sold of its 300 sedans.

2017-18 FINANCIAL YEAR SALES