Mexico July 2021: Market up 12.7%, MG appears at #13, Chevrolet Captiva breaks into Top 10

The Chevrolet Captiva aka Baojun 530 is now inside the Mexican Top 10.

New light vehicle sales in Mexico are up 12.7% year-on-year in July to 82.157 units, leading to a year-to-date tally up  18.3% to 602.681. We however remain well below the pre-pandemic levels of July 2019 at -22.3% for the month (vs. 105.712 units) and -19% year-to-date (vs. 744.387). Nissan (+9.2%) trails the market slightly but easily remains the most popular carmaker in the country, selling almost double any other brand. Toyota (+35.2%) surges two spots on June to land in 2nd place which is believed to be its new Mexican ranking record with its previous best being #3 in January 2018 and May 2020. As a result Chevrolet (-26.8%) also suffering from the microchip crisis like in Brazil and Argentina, and Volkswagen (+0.6%) are pushed down to #3 and #4 respectively. Five of the next six brands outpace the market with solid double-digit gains, starting with Mazda (+56.5%), Hyundai (+28.4%) and Kia (+25.9%) but also including Ford (+20%) and Renault (+15.8%). Just outside the Top 10, Seat (+80.7%) stuns with a fantastic uptick. We have a new brand in the Mexican charts this month: MG lands directly at #13 with 2.3% share, and year-to-date sales, available retrospectively, put the brand at #18 with 1.2% share. This means MG easily takes the lead of the Chinese offensive in Mexico above JAC (#22) and BAIC (#30).

Over in the models ranking, the Nissan Versa (+5.9%) and Pickup (+6.9%) are faithful to their YTD positions at #1 and #2 respectively. In third place, the Kia Rio (+58.1%) breaks its share record for the third month running, distancing the Nissan March (+10.1%) and Chevrolet Aveo (+44%). Outstanding results also for the VW Vento (+26.9%), Hyundai Grand i10 (+253.2%) and Toyota Hilux (+33.8%) whereas the Nissan Sentra (-12.3%) is in difficulty. The hero of the month is the Chevrolet Captiva (aka Baojun 530) up 20 spots on June to break into the Mexican Top 10 for the first time at #9. It confirms Mexican customers are starting to bite into Chinese imports. Speaking of which, the MG ZS makes its first appearance in the charts directly at #21 with 1.3% share and #57 year-to-date with 0.5% of the market. Below the Captiva and ZS, the Chevrolet Tracker is the next best-selling recent launch (<12 months) at #30 (-10%) while the VW Taos is down 25 ranks on last month to #35.

Previous month: Mexico June 2021: VW Taos breaks into Top 10 in market up 38.6%

One year ago: Mexico July 2020: Chevrolet Onix breaks into Top 5, Hyundai Creta into Top 10 in struggling market (-31%)

Full July 2021 Top 40 All-brands and Top 290 All-models below.