China Surpasses U.S. as Top Car Supplier to Mexico

Chinese car purchases at the end of last year reached $4.602 billion, while American car imports totaled $4.486 billion, according to data from the Secretariat of Economy of the Mexican government.

According to information from the agency, China has already positioned itself as the main car importer to Mexico, surpassing the United States.

Information from the Mexican Association of Automotive Dealers (AMDA) indicates that 19.5 percent of local market sales are from vehicle imports from China, which include American brands that manufacture their vehicles in the Asian country. It is worth noting that not all Chinese brands that are marketed in the country report their sales to Inegi.

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"Mexico started importing vehicles from China in 2005, when General Motors brought the Cavalier and the Aveo," said Armando Soto, president of the consulting firm Kaso y Asociados.

He pointed out that from 2010 to 2016, car imports from China ceased, and since 2016, General Motors has again brought its models from China.

With the arrival of the pandemic in 2019, Chinese brands took advantage of the lack of inventory in other brands and began to market their models with low prices, immediate delivery, and vehicles equipped with technology, he pointed out.

From January to June of this year, 708,650 new cars were sold nationwide in Mexico; of that total, 469,921 were imported models, and of those, 19.7 percent came from China, according to AMDA data.

The biggest example is that the third best-selling light vehicle model in the country is the Aveo, manufactured by General Motors in China, which sold 27,010 units in the first half of this year and is the best-selling imported segment car.

Mexico imports vehicles from 23 countries.