Car imports drop in February
Vietnamese auto businesses imported about 5,000 completely built-up unit (CBU) cars, worth US$131 million, in February, 1,000 cars less than the previous month, the General Statistic Office (GSO) said.
This was a sharp fall in car imports this year, but had been expected because of the nine-day Tet (Lunar New Year) holiday in February, during which business operations and transactions were suspended in the market.
In addition, the government began applying a new calculation of a special consumption tax on January 1, 2016, which caused the price of imported cars to rise by an estimated 5%. Therefore, many people bought cars in the last few months of last year, before the new calculation came into effect.
 |
The turnover of imported cars is predicted to increase this year, but the auto market will not experience a ‘boom’ as in 2015.
GSO said Vietnam imported 11,000 cars in the first two months of this year, worth US$280 million, a decrease of 31.1% in quantity and 11.9% in value year-on-year.
