The sudden outbreak of new crown pneumonia disrupted Yang Linsheng's plans. After being ordered to close the store before the Spring Festival, Yang Linsheng's luxury car showroom has not been able to open for business until now.
A cold wind blew, and Yang Linsheng, who was sitting in the empty luxury car showroom, was a little hesitant. "This winter, it's too cold." He told the unexpected financial reporter.
Yang Linsheng is a parallel import car practitioner. The "coldness" in his mouth is not only the cold wind blowing the progress hall, but also the cold winter that the entire industry is facing. These are directly determining his fate in this industry, and this he The life and death of the luxury car showroom that has worked hard for many years.
Industry outbreak
Six years ago, when Yang Linsheng's friend Mr. Hu found him, hoping to enter the parallel import car industry together, the whole industry just started to sprout. In the following years, the market demand for the parallel imported car industry began to blow out rapidly, and the annual growth rate of the industry was more than 20%. Yang Linsheng's company also developed from a small company to a large exhibition hall with a business area of more than 5,000 square meters. , Decorated more luxurious than the surrounding 4S shops. During peak periods, the annual turnover of a luxury car showroom was as high as nearly 100 million yuan.
The so-called parallel imported cars are parallel imported trade cars. They mainly refer to some cars that are purchased directly from overseas by dealers and imported into the Chinese market for sale without the authorization of a branded car company. The Middle East version, European version, etc. are different from the normal imported vehicles (referred to as "standard vehicles") sold by multinational automobile companies in China's officially authorized channels.
In contrast to a Chinese car imported from abroad to the country, it must pass through the “Customs Entry → China General Distributor → Regional Distributor → Regional Distributor (4S Store)” to reach the end consumer, and a parallel import After the car is purchased at overseas dealers and entered through customs, it can be sold directly to the terminal through import traders. More flat channels will directly reduce the price of an imported car by 10% to 15%. Rich models and favorable prices, parallel imported cars have won the favor of some customers.
As a means to curb the monopoly and profiteering of imported cars, some local governments have frequently issued policies to promote the development of the parallel imported car industry. In October 2014, as the national level began to issue policies to promote the layout of parallel imported vehicle trials, the market for parallel imported vehicles began to grow rapidly. Since then, several favorable policies, such as the “Measures for the Administration of Automobile Sales” and “Announcement on Pilot Measures for 3C Certification Reform of Parallel Imported Cars in the Free Trade Zone” have been released. The market share of parallel imported cars in the entire imported car market has gradually increased, from 7.7% to 14.2%. .
In April 2017, when the Ministry of Commerce promulgated the "Measures for the Administration of Automobile Sales", in order to break the possible "vertical monopoly" of suppliers and promote cooperation between suppliers and dealers in a more fair and reasonable environment, they decided to cancel the brand authorization. Single sales model.
Since then, the development of the compliant and simplified parallel import vehicle industry has peaked. Throughout 2017, the industry imported a total of 172,400 parallel-import vehicles, an increase of 29.5% over 2016. At the time, the annual import volume of national-standard vehicles was only over 900,000, and it was close to 30 parallel imports. Compared with the annual growth rate of%, the year-on-year growth rate of medium-sized cars in the year was only 0.9%, showing a slowdown in demand and weak growth.
Tianjin Port, which has been engaged in the import of complete vehicles since the 1990s, relies on its many years of industrial advantages and a market share of about 70% to maintain its position as the largest port for parallel imported vehicles in China. In 2017, Tianjin Port imported a total of 122,200 parallel-import vehicles, accounting for nearly 70% of the country's total. It has become the country's main trade hub for parallel-import vehicles. Therefore, local purchases, freight forwarding, and customs clearance inspections have been formed around the parallel-import vehicle industry. , Warehouse logistics, financing credit, after-sales three guarantees and a complete set of complete and efficient parallel import vehicle purchase and sale industry chain. Due to the large number of companies in the bonded area, which account for almost one-third of the country, in 2015, Tianjin also initiated the establishment of a parallel import automobile circulation industry association, namely the Tianjin Parallel Import Automobile Distribution Association (hereinafter referred to as "Jinping" Auto Association ").
Great change
"At that time, the car was really easy to sell. Any car with a gross profit of more than 50,000. Some of the best-selling luxury cars could make one or two hundred thousand." Yang Linsheng at the time, while completing the accumulation of wealth, , Also began to look forward to the company's future, but the subsequent two successive blows, not only caused his company to be hit hard, even his parallel import car industry is also facing great changes.
Due to the impact of Sino-US trade frictions and the Sixth-State policy, parallel imports of vehicles have ended high growth. In 2018, the import volume of the entire industry fell to 139,700 units. In 2019, although the cumulative import volume of parallel imported vehicles rose to 163,200 units in the whole year, the shadow of the country six that has been covering the head has already made many practitioners feel excited. dim.
"In 2018, due to the impact of trade frictions, the sales volume of the exhibition hall has begun to decline; by 2019, affected by the 'national five to national six' policy, our company's sales in the second half of the year fell by nearly 30% year-on-year." Yang Linsheng accepted The reporter of the First Financial News recalled with painful recollection that at this time, the originally swarming customers began to wait and see. This was the worst blow that he had suffered in the 6 years in the industry.
In fact, "National Five to National Six" was originally a policy for all vehicles to limit exhaust emissions, and the entire parallel import car industry was hit the most because of the original Ministry of Environmental Protection and the original state on December 23, 2016 "Light Vehicle Pollutant Emission Limits and Measurement Methods (China Phase VI)" jointly issued by the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine.
Zhang Tingting, secretary general of Jinping Automobile Association, recalled that at the time when the two ministries and commissions specified the standard, parallel imported cars were still in the initial stage of development, failed to attract the attention of the country and the market, and the enterprises were not able to participate in the early policy formulation in a timely manner. Therefore, the formulation of this standard mainly takes into account the automobile manufacturers, but ignores the "unauthorized" and "non-mass production" nature of traders who import parallel cars. This caused the whole industry to be in a very passive position after the introduction of the National Sixth Standard.
Subsequently, on July 3, 2018, the State Council publicly released the "Three-year Action Plan for Winning the Defense of the Blue Sky" (hereinafter referred to as the "Plan"). According to this plan, the state will accelerate the elimination of old and highly polluting vehicles from the same time as 2019. Beginning July 1, 2014, the implementation of the National Sixth Emission Standard will be implemented in key areas (Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei and surrounding areas, the Yangtze River Delta, the Fenwei Plain, the Pearl River Delta, and Chengdu-Chongqing areas) in advance.
After that, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment and the State Administration of Market Supervision and Administration jointly issued a document stating that starting from July 1, 2020, all gas vehicles produced, imported, sold, and registered in the Chinese market should meet the requirements of the State Six emission standards. Before entering the market.
Yang Linsheng said that before the implementation of the National Sixth Standard, China ’s automobile emission standards basically refer to Europe and the United States. Therefore, when foreign vehicles enter the Chinese market for sale, they generally do not need to make targeted adaptations. However, starting from the National Sixth Standard, China has independently developed its own emission standards in accordance with China's national conditions. This means that these imported cars from abroad will not be able to fully meet the Sixth National Standards and need to be adapted. Previously, the standard cars imported from abroad to China have been basically transformed with the support of manufacturers. However, because the design of parallel imported cars is not targeted at the Chinese market, it is aimed at the environmental standards of the country of sale, such as the United States. , Japan, the Middle East market, etc. Parallel imported cars and large-scale cars are largely competitive, and auto manufacturers have no incentive to specifically target the Chinese market for technological transformation.
The final result is that based on the status of an unauthorized trader of parallel imported cars, parallel imported cars cannot provide vehicle design parameter data and technical support that must be authorized by the manufacturer in accordance with the current national environmental protection policy requirements. Therefore, even if the vehicle meets the national environmental protection standards, the national environmental protection information disclosure cannot be obtained according to the existing experimental methods. If this problem cannot be solved, parallel imported cars will be forced to withdraw from the market after July 1, 2020.
The outbreak is worse
As parallel imported cars have always had the advantages of more abundant models and more affordable prices, many customers still use them as new car purchase options. Therefore, although the ban on sales is approaching, some industry practitioners, including Yang Linsheng, still hoard some Vehicles, hoping to sell them before the ban.
However, the sudden outbreak of new crown pneumonia disrupted Yang Linsheng's plans. After being ordered to close the store before the Spring Festival, Yang Linsheng's luxury car showroom has not been able to open for business until now.
Jinping Automobile Association also conducted a survey on the status of the parallel import automobile industry in February this year and found that 92.9% of the 113 parallel import automobile trading companies surveyed have not yet resumed work. Even if the resumed enterprises are mostly remote offices, corporate business In a state of stagnation.
"Now the entire industry is struggling." Zhang Tingting said in an interview with First Financial News that the entire parallel import car industry had already been severely hit by the National Six problem, and now the epidemic has worsened the situation, making it difficult for companies to resume work. Even if some trade-type enterprises resume work, the supporting companies on the industrial chain have not yet resumed work in full, and customers outside of China cannot purchase cars in Tianjin. These will seriously affect the operation of the parallel imported automobile industry. The backlog of enterprises will be serious, and funds will not operate normally. The entire port Business stagnation is in an extremely difficult state.
Eyeing on July 1, the lock-up period is approaching, leaving Yang Linsheng to sell for less than 4 months. What made him even more keen is that in order to facilitate the turnover of funds, these parallel imported cars for sale were purchased through financial leverage. Once they could not be sold in time, they had to cut the meat and sell it before the ban on sales was reached. Otherwise, One of the most direct results was that the car was confiscated and he had to carry a large debt.
"If the digestion of inventory cannot be completed quickly, companies will suffer heavy losses, and many companies will face bankruptcy and bankruptcy, which will also trigger a series of financial risks." Jinping Automobile Association pointed out in the above research report.
The data shows that of the 113 companies surveyed, 108 have no business since the Spring Festival, accounting for 95.6%, and only 3 companies that have consulted have sold 5 cars, and the remaining 2 companies have It means that although receiving a consultation call and an intentional order, due to the impact of the epidemic, the car cannot be seen or delivered, and it is still uncertain whether the sales will be successful. In other words, due to the impact of the epidemic, the sales of parallel imported cars are almost stagnant, and even some companies have said that customers who received car purchase deposits before the same year also refunded the deposit because the company could not properly deliver the car, and the company suffered serious losses.
The most direct consequence of this is that of the 113 companies surveyed, more than 50% of them clearly stated that because the inventory of vehicles could not be sold, they occupied a large amount of funds, and the funds could not be normally turned around. However, during the epidemic period, companies still have to pay employees' operating expenses such as wages, rent, storage costs, and loans and remittances due. Enterprises are facing huge financial pressures, and business operations will encounter serious problems.
In addition, after a telephone survey of parallel import car core warehouses and large car cities in the three major functional areas, including the Tianjin Port Free Trade Zone, Dongjiang Free Trade Port Zone and Development Zone, Jinping Automobile Association found that only Tianjin Port to be digested in parallel The total inventory of imported cars reached about 25,000 units, with a total value of about 16.5 billion yuan. The association also estimated that at present there are at least 40,000 units of parallel imported cars nationwide, with a total value of about 2.6 billion yuan.
Jinping Automobile Association pointed out that the epidemic has had eight specific impacts on the entire industry, including the inability to resume work normally and work; the national 6 standard has counted down and the original national 5 vehicle inventory cannot be effectively digested; if the national 6 standard is on schedule Implementation, the effective time to resolve the Sixth Issue will be very limited, and the parallel import auto industry will face a serious crisis of industry demise; the company's capital cannot be normally turned over, and it will face the risk of a broken capital chain; logistics is almost interrupted, and port wholesalers cannot Ship to downstream distributors, especially Hunan, Hubei and surrounding areas.
"Almost every week I can hear the news of friends leaving and changing careers in the industry." Yang Linsheng said that although parallel imports are just a niche industry for Volkswagen, even if each car is valued at 600,000 yuan, This is also an industry with an annual output value of nearly 100 billion. The entire industrial chain involves more than 100,000 employees in international trade, logistics, sales, after-sales, finance, insurance and other industries.
At the same time, Jinping Automobile Association also mentioned in a research report that if no solution can be found for the National Six problem of the parallel import automobile industry, this industry will no longer exist, which will bring a blow to the development of vehicle ports across the country. The country's vigorous efforts to promote the parallel import of automobiles will also be completely disintegrated.
As a witness to the development of the industry, Zhang Tingting believes that compared to traditional imported cars, parallel imported cars have an irreplaceable market value. One is to break monopoly and stabilize prices, so that Chinese consumers can enjoy equal quality and equivalence. High-end imported automobile consumer products; secondly, it can help promote the supply-side structural reform in the automotive sector, accelerate the innovation and development of the automobile distribution system, and stimulate the vitality of the automobile market. Many models of parallel imported cars are not introduced in the Chinese market. The introduction of such models will not only force overseas OEMs to speed up the introduction of new technologies into the Chinese market and the introduction of new technologies. It can also be used to adjust the trade deficit and promote international trade. Balanced development.
"The legitimate parallel import automobile industry is facing such a severe situation, and the time left for our industry to solve the problem has been very limited, coupled with the sudden outbreak of new crown pneumonia, this problem has been put on hold again. The entire life cycle of the parallel import automobile industry It has entered the countdown. "As for the prospect of the industry, as the secretary general of Jinping Automobile Association, which directly serves parallel import car companies, Zhang Tingting is also full of urgency and anxiety.
At the same time, automotive industry organizations, including the China Automobile Industry Association, the All-China Federation of Industry and Commerce Automobile Dealer Chambers of Commerce, are actively submitting applications to the Ministry of Commerce and other ministries and commissions, hoping to delay the implementation of National Six emission standards in order to respond to the new crown Impact of the automotive industry.
(Yang Linsheng changed his name)