Hopes of a big rise in car sales in October thanks to a steep drop in prices and the rollout of new models have been dashed, spreading more gloom about the sector’s health.

A corner of the Vietnam Motor Show 2019

The Vietnam Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (VAMA) said on November 11 that total car sales in October reached 28,948 units, a slight increase of 4.3 percent compared to September but much lower than the rest of the year.

 Of the total number, sales of passenger cars inched up 2 percent to 21,355 vehicles, while figures for commercial and special-purpose vehicles leaped 11 percent and 14 percent to 7,228 and 365, respectively.

 Some 16,406 domestically-assembled cars were sold, falling 3 percent month on month, while sales of imported units climbed 16 percent to 12,542.

 Toyota continued to lead sales with 7,216 vehicles, followed by Mitsubishi (3,566 units), Ford (3,114 units), and Honda (3,058 units).

 A series of promotions were offered by dealers during October, but experts said they were not attractive enough to entice customers.

 Even the Vietnam Motor Show 2019 which took place at late October was unable to have a major impact, with visitors merely browsing the latest models and advanced technologies.

 Experts believe the Vietnamese automobile market will rev up at the end of the year and the beginning of 2020 as the Lunar New year nears and demand for cars is high.

 During January-October, VAMA members sold a total 259,282 units, a year-on-year increase of 16 percent.

 However, the sales figures did not reflect the country’s entire automobile market as they did not include sales of other manufacturers that are not VAMA members. For example, TC Motor sold 7,737 units in October, increasing its total sales in the first ten months to 63,210 units.

 Meanwhile, several VAMA members such as Audi, Jaguar, Land Rover, Mercedes-Benz, Subaru, Volkswagen, Volvo and VinFast did not announce their sales figures or did not send sales reports to VAMA.