China's passenger vehicle sales rose 4.3% in September from a year earlier, snapping five months of decline with a boost from a government subsidy to encourage trade-ins as part of a broader stimulus package.
All the gains came from battery-powered vehicles, whose buyers and manufacturers have benefited since July from a doubling of subsidies to consumers, while sales of gasoline cars in China, a market foreign brands once dominated, continue to shrink.
Sales in the world's biggest auto market hit 2.13 million vehicles in September, up from 2.04 million a year earlier. For the first nine months, sales were up 1.9% from 2023 levels, according to data from the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA).