DETROIT — Led by hot demand among Chinese consumers for SUVs, America’s two largest automakers saw sales boosts in China in June.
New vehicle sales in China rose for both General Motors and Ford and their joint venture partners, culminating a strong first half in the world’s largest auto market.
GM and its partners sold 273,563 vehicles last month, up 11.2% from June 2015. Sales by Ford and its joint venture partners in China rose 2.5% in June.
For the first half, GM and its joint ventures sold 1.8 million, up 5.3% from a year earlier. Ford’s first half sales rose 6% to 577,097.
“Sales of Cadillac and Buick remained strong throughout 2016,” said Matt Tsien, president of GM China. “We’re also seeing very high demand for our Baojun entry-level passenger car brand.”
Dave Schoch, Ford group vice president and president of Asia Pacific said, “Even as the pace of growth slows and the market matures, customers continue to respond well to our products, particularly our world-class SUV lineup.”
SUVs drove most of the increase as sales of the Ford EcoSport, Kuga, Edge, Everest and Explorer; and Lincoln MKC, MKX and Navigator rose 27% in the first half to more than 150,000 vehicles.
Related: Ford has now sold more than 1 million F-150s with EcoBoost
Sales of Ford’s two largest China joint ventures, Changan Ford Automobile and Jiangling Motors Corp., increased in June by 4% and 5%, respectively.
Changan, which produces passenger cars, reported a 10% sales increase for the first half, compared with a year earlier. Jiangling’s first-half sales fell 7% as demand softened for the commercial vehicles it makes.
Lincoln’s sales in China nearly tripled in the first half of 2016 to 12,450.
Buick sales in June increased 10% to 86,054, led by the Excelle GT sedan (more than 26,000).
Cadillac sales in June surged 34% to 9,552. But Chevrolet posted a 25% decline to 35,648. The new Malibu XL just recently went on sale in China and the new Cruze will be launched later this summer.
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