China vehicle sales slid 18% in August

[BEIJING] China's auto sales fell 17.8 per cent in August from the corresponding month a year earlier, industry data showed on Friday.

Overall sales in the world's biggest car market stood at 1.8 million vehicles in August, data from the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers (CAAM) showed.

For the first eight months of the year, China's vehicle sales jumped 13.7 per cent as the market recovered from pandemic lows.

One bright spot in August was continued strong sales of new energy vehicles, which more than doubled to 321,000 vehicles.

These include battery-powered electric vehicles, plug-in petrol-electric hybrids and hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles.

The government's promotion of greener vehicles to cut pollution has prompted electric car makers such as Nio, Xpeng and BYD to expand manufacturing capacity in China.

REUTERS