Turkey Autos Report Q1 2013 - New Market Study Published

Recently published research from Business Monitor International, "Turkey Autos Report Q1 2013", is now available at Fast Market Research

by Bill Thompson

(WireNews+Co) - Boston, MA - 22 February 2013

Despite our bearish outlook for autos production in Turkey in the short term, we remain fairly optimistic about long-term growth in the sector, on the back of both strong domestic sales and export growth.

In the first 11 months of 2012, passenger car production in Turkey declined 9.6% year-on-year (y-o-y), to 531,952 units, prompting us to downgrade our 2012 production forecast to a drop of 8.4%, with a 9.5% decrease in the passenger car segment. Over the longer term, however, we expect the country's political stability, its Customs Union with the EU and investment from international carmakers to facilitate growth in exports and production.

We hold a similarly optimistic outlook for vehicle sales, where we expect a resurgence in private consumption to boost vehicle demand. We forecast a moderate 0.8% y-o-y growth in passenger car sales in 2013, to be followed by average annual growth of just over 4% y-o-y between 2014 and 2017.

View Full Report Details and Table of Contents (http://www.fastmr.com/prod/536574_turkey_autos_report_q1_2013.aspx?afid=201) (http://www.fastmr.com/prod/536574_turkey_autos_report_q1_2013.aspx?afid=201)

We believe commercial vehicle sales will outperform, with annual average growth of 6.8% in our forecast period to 2017. Total vehicle sales over the first 11 months of 2012 fell 10.3% y-o-y, to 696,501 units.

The extent of long-term optimism in the market was visible from the launch of a joint venture (JV) between South Korean Hyundai Motor and Turkish Karasan in December 2012. The US$260mn JV will produce Hyundai-branded light commercial vehicles. Earlier in October 2012, locally based automotive supplier Inci Holding announced the opening of its latest domestic facility, a JV with Brazil's Maxion Wheels that will produce wheel rims. The EUR45mn (US$58.6mn) site will have an annual capacity of around 2mn wheel rims.

We also expect Turkey to reap the benefits of rising Russian demand. We have become increasingly bullish on the Russian vehicle market, and expect to see ongoing interest in the export market. Honda Motor plans to expand capacity at its production facility in Turkey by 26%, to 63,000 vehicles annually to cater to growing demand in Russia. Meanwhile, Russian automaker Gorkovsky Avtomobilny Zavod (GAZ) operates a JV with Turkey's Mersa Otomotiv, which will assemble, distribute and sell light commercial GAZ vehicles in Turkey. Turkey's biggest automotive export markets currently are France, Italy, Germany, the UK, Spain, the US, Romania, Belgium, Algeria and Russia.

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