To understand why China is desperate to ship cars overseas, visit a dealership in Beijing.
Autumn has traditionally been the peak time to buy vehicles in the country, but this year many showrooms are empty or shut.
Car salesman Li Ke said that other than the Covid-19 pandemic, the 2026 “golden September and silver October” season, as it’s known, is the slowest he’s seen in his 26 years on the job.
“In past years, customers would come to the showrooms nonstop,” he told CNBC during an interview in his deserted showroom at a complex of dealerships on the outskirts of the Chinese capital. “We would have deals to sign every day. But nowadays we see only two to three deals a week. It’s a dramatic drop.”
Many people in China aren’t buying cars because an unstable job market and a continued slide in property prices have undercut consumer confidence. The government has also scaled back incentives such as cash-for-clunkers subsidies and tax…
