Sales of passenger cars fell for the seventh consecutive month by 17.7% year-on-year, the largest fall in seven years. Photo: AFP

China’s auto market continued its apparent downward trend in January, after witnessing its first negative growth in 2018, Yicai.com reported.

The production and sales of automobile recorded 2.365 million and 2.367 million, respectively, down 12.1% and 15.8% from a year earlier, data released by China Association of Automobile Manufacturers on Monday showed.

Of that, the sales of passenger cars fell for the seventh consecutive month by 17.7% year-on-year, the largest fall in seven years.

However, new energy cars are still performing well, bucking the overall trend. The production and sales of new energy vehicles were 91,000 and 96,000 in January, respectively, an increase of 113% and 138%.

There are also seasonal factors, such as consumers tending to delay car purchases around the Chinese New Year Holiday. The auto market will likely continue to decline in February, said Xu Haidong, assistant to the secretary general of CAAM.

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