The decline in car sales is ongoing. After a 21% drop in January, the cumulative decline in the first three months of the year stands at 16.6%, with 89,041 new cars sold by official importers in Israel in January, February, and March, excluding parallel and small imports.
In October, following the Hamas attacks, car sales in the country were halted, but they have slowly recovered amidst the economic slowdown caused by the war and the increase in prices of new cars due to higher purchase taxes on electric cars and increased transportation costs from factories in China, Japan, and Thailand due to pirate attacks.
Despite this, the share of Chinese-made cars in Israel has reached an all-time high this year, with almost one in every five new cars in the country being manufactured in China. Not only from Chinese brands like BYD, Geely, and MG, but also models from non-Chinese or non-identifiable manufacturers, such as Tesla Model 3 and the new Smart 1, of which 50% of the shares belong to Geely. Relatively high sales of new Chinese brands in Israel like Xpeng, SERES, and ZEEKR have contributed to this trend.
And so, 20,444 of the cars that hit the roads this year were made in China, a 10% increase compared to the same period last year. South Korea decreased by 14% to second place, with 16,225 cars, followed by Japan, with a 13% decrease to 12,633. Czech Republic, in fourth place, rose by 5% to 8,667 cars due to an increase in Skoda sales, while Turkey crashed by 24% to 7,305 cars.
The BYD Atto 3 continues to lead the market by a large margin (5,220), followed by Hyundai Elantra (2,745), Skoda Octavia making a comeback (2,098), Hyundai i20 (with 1,959), Geely Geometry C (with 1,932), Kia Picanto (also 1,932), Hyundai Tucson (1,799), Mazda 2 (1,762), Hyundai Kona (1,648), and Toyota Corolla (1,508).
Among the top five best-selling models, two are fully electric, and three are mainly or only sold in hybrid versions.
Among the manufacturers, Hyundai continues to lead the market with 12,036 sales (34% decrease), followed by Kia with 9,645 sales (23%), Toyota (8,103, 7%), BYD (6,990, 19% increase), Skoda (6,017, 22% increase), Mazda (5,111, 33% decrease), Mitsubishi (3,794, 2% decrease), Suzuki (2,939, 15% decrease), Chery (2,811, 40% decrease), and MG (1,958, 11% increase).
Among the top ten best-selling brands, there are three Chinese, two Korean, one European, and four Japanese.