Vehicle sales down 1.4% in July

Carmakers in China sold 2.39 million vehicles in July, down 1.4 percent from the same period last year, according to the China Association of Automobile Manufacturers.

Chen Shihua, deputy secretary-general of the CAAM, said the performance is decent considering the high comparative base in the same month last year.

Sales in the first seven months combined totaled 15.62 million units, up 7.9 percent year-on-year, according to the CAAM.

Of them, passenger vehicle sales reached 13.37 million units, up 6.7 percent from the same period last year.

NEVs have retained their growth momentum. Their sales in July stood at 780,000 units, up 31.6 percent year-on-year.

They brought sales in the first seven months this year to 4.53 million units, up 41.7 percent year-on-year.

The popularity of NEVs helped increased the market share of Chinese marques. Last month, Chinese brands combined seized a 57.2 percent share of the country's passenger car market. For the period from January to July, the figure stood at 53.8 percent.

Wang Chuanfu, chairman and president of BYD, estimated that the share of Chinese marques would reach 70 percent by 2025 thanks to their edge in the NEV sector.

BYD's 5 millionth NEV, a Denza N7, rolled off the assembly line on Thursday, making the Warren Buffet-backed company the first carmaker globally to reach the milestone.