New vehicle sales in Taiwan dipped 17 percent month-on-month last month, as buyers delayed purchases of new cars while they wait for the government to confirm the implementation date of new commodity tax incentives, online market researcher U-Car said in a report yesterday.
New car sales dropped to 29,460 units from 35,483 units in July, the second-lowest sales level this year, its data showed. The lowest was in February, when only 27,515 vehicles were sold.
On an annual basis, sales inched up 0.2 percent, the data showed.
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The results stoked fears of gloomy car sales for the whole year, as the market is already weighed down uncertainty over US tariffs.
In the first eight months of this year, new car sales tumbled 14.2 percent year-on-year to 263,910 units.
Legislators on Friday gave the go-ahead to a new measure that extends commodity tax incentives to 2030 and widens the coverage to include buyers of small passenger vehicles with engine displacements of less than 2 liters.
The existing rules are to expire on Jan. 7 next year.
Car buyers would be eligible for a NT$5,000 commodity tax reduction when buying a new car. Another NT$5,000 cut could be stacked on if they are buying a new car to retire an older vehicle.
As no implementation date has been announced, car sales could stall again this month to about 30,000 units, Hotai Motor Co (和泰汽車) said.
Hotai said that its sales dropped 12.5 percent month-on-month to 11,914 units last month.
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