Improving supply boosts market

There were 110,702 registrations of new vehicles in Australia last month, which was up by 18.3 per cent from the same period a year ago and set a new industry record for September.

Four of the past five months have now delivered new records as the supply of vehicles into Australia continues to improve, says the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI).

Last month’s tally, which compares with 93,555 sales in September 2022, takes the number of registrations for the year-to-date to 899,286.

Toyota’s Hilux, pictured, retained its position as the best-selling model with 5,776 sales in September. 

Next up was the Ford Ranger on 5,429, Tesla’s Model Y with 3,811, the Isuzu D-Max on 2,885 and Toyota’s RAV4 with 2,798.

Toyota was also top of the marques’ ladder last month with 20,912 registrations, followed by Mazda on 8,031 units.

Ford with 8,015 sales, Kia on 7,303 and Hyundai with 6,217 completed the top five.

The FCAI says electric vehicles – battery electric vehicles (BEVS), plug-in hybrids and hybrids – accounted for 18.3 per cent of the new-vehicle market in September. BEVS alone made up eight per cent of sales.

Registrations of SUVs and light commercial vehicles took out 79.4 per cent of the market last month, with passenger vehicles securing 16.8 per cent.