Commercial vehicle market off to a slow start in the first quarter

The commercial vehicle market in Switzerland and the Principality of Liechtenstein has had a tough start to the year. By the end of March, a total of 9,523 light and heavy commercial and passenger transport vehicles had been registered, 1,179 or 11 percent fewer than in the first quarter of 2021, according to market data from auto-schweiz, the Association of Swiss Automobile Importers. Only motor homes, as part of the passenger transport vehicle segment, can still boast a small increase of 5.8 percent. But here, too, the industry association expects a decline in new registrations in the coming months - due to supply bottlenecks for vendor parts at vehicle manufacturers.

Supply bottlenecks affect the commercial vehicle market

What are the causes of the decline? According to auto-schweiz, it is the war in Ukraine that is making life difficult for the Swiss commercial vehicle market on various levels. On the one hand, the wartime events have severed some supply chains of parts for production. Similar to passenger cars, semiconductor products or cable harnesses produced in Ukraine, among other places, are missing, the association says. On the other hand, Russia's armed attack on Ukraine could result in subdued economic growth. For example, the federal government's group of experts has already lowered its growth forecast for Switzerland in 2022 to 2.8 percent, it says. In addition to the Ukraine conflict, higher inflation is also putting the brakes on economic recovery, the report continues.

Accordingly, only 6,637 new light commercial vehicles were registered in the first three months of the year, 14.6 percent fewer than in the same period last year (7,772). The latest figures are even down another 4.4 percent on the first quarter of the first Corona year 2020. The supplier crisis is also having a major impact on deliveries of heavy commercial vehicles. From January to March, 790 new trucks have been registered, 12.3 percent less than in the previous year, when there were 901. Here, in turn, the figure in the first quarter of 2020 was still significantly higher at 976, as heavy commercial vehicles usually still undergo a special assembly process before they are delivered and thus hit the roads with a greater time lag after they are ordered.

The only bright spot: Motorhomes

By contrast, the number of registrations of new passenger transport vehicles stabilized at a high level, rising by 3.3 percent. Once again, this was primarily due to camper vans, which accounted for 1,945 of the total of 2,096 registrations in the first quarter. This meant that campers accounted for an even larger share of this segment (92.8 percent) than they did a year ago (90.6%, 1,839 of 2,029). "Actually, we wanted to start a catch-up in the commercial vehicle market in 2022," auto-schweiz media spokesman Christoph Wolnik commented on the current market situation. "But the outbreak of the Ukraine war has made this impossible, at least in the first quarter. We are hoping for an improvement in the supply situation as the year progresses - and above all for an end to the armed conflict as soon as possible."

Together with the 54,227 passenger cars, a total of 63,750 new motor vehicles were put into circulation in Switzerland and the Principality of Liechtenstein in the first quarter of 2022. Compared to the previous year's figure of 67,199, this represents a decrease of 3,449 new registrations or 5.1 percent.

Source: auto-schweiz