Shark swims into top four

Toyota beat Ford in the battle to lead the market for new commercials in January by having the number-one model and being the best-selling marque – but a plug-in hybrid ute making the top four is what will have caught many people’s eye.

BYD’s recently launched Shark 6, pictured, was fourth on the models’ table last month with 194 sales, putting it behind the top three mainstays of the market.

Leading the sales charts was Toyota’s Hilux on 613 units for a 21.9 per cent share of the market. That was a 6.6 per cent decrease from 656 units in the same month of last year.

Toyota also came top of the marques’ ladder with 765 registrations, which represented a year-on-year fall of 19.5 per cent from 950 sales in January 2024, and a 27.3 per cent market share. 

There were 2,799 new commercials registered in total last month, which was down 38.1 per cent from 4,520 in January last year when there was a spike in demand for light commercial vehicles following the end of the clean discount.

Ford’s Ranger came second on the models’ table. It sold 553 units – down 62.4 per cent from 1,471 – and clinched a 19.8 per cent share of the market. 

The Mitsubishi Triton was third with nine per cent. It sold 253 units, which was down by 23.1 per cent from 329. 

Completing the top five was the BYD Shark 6 followed by Nissan’s Navara on 169 sales.

Ford was the second-placed light-commercial marque in January with 642 sales for a market share of 22.9 per cent. This was down by 60 per cent from 1,603 in the same month of last year.

Mitsubishi was third on 253 units, BYD fourth with 194 and Nissan completed last month’s top five on 169.

Used market falls

There were 363 used-imported commercials registered for the first time last month, which was 47.3 per cent fewer than the 689 units in January last year.

Toyota was the number-one marque with 175 registrations for a market share of 48.2 per cent despite its sales falling 50.3 per cent from 352 units in the same month of 2024.

Its Hiace was the leading model with 39.7 per cent of January’s market thanks to 144 sales, which was down from 268.

Nissan was runner-up on the marques’ ladder last month with 80 sales for a 22 per cent share of the market, and Ford, Hino and Isuzu all tied for third with 19 units.

The Nissan NV350 was second best-selling model with 25 units, and the marque’s NV200 was third with 23 sales during January.