Vietnam is catching up with ASEAN countries in terms of car purchasing demand.

According to the FTCR research department of the British Financial Times, the number of Vietnamese consumers planning to buy a car in the next 6 months has increased significantly and is catching up with the car shopping trend of consumers in neighboring Southeast Asian countries.

The ASEAN Car Purchase Index conducted by FTCR, along with data from the past four years, shows a steady increase in the number of Vietnamese consumers intending to buy cars, higher than other ASEAN countries such as the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia.

Over the past four years, the average proportion of urban consumers in ASEAN economies intending to buy a car has been 1 in 4. In Vietnam, the average proportion in 2016 and 2017 was over 15%, up from 11.9% in 2013 and the highest among the five ASEAN countries including the Philippines, Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia and Vietnam.

The narrowing gap in car buying demand among Vietnamese consumers compared to neighboring ASEAN countries shows that strong economic growth over the past four years has brought about a significant increase in wages and discretionary spending among Vietnam's middle class.

Official figures show that car sales in Vietnam increased sharply from 2013 to 2016, although they have slowed down somewhat since the beginning of 2017.

According to FTCR, the reason for this slowdown is that Vietnamese consumers are delaying their car purchase decisions until 2018, waiting for the government to cut import taxes from other ASEAN countries from the current 30% to 0%. FTCR forecasts that car sales in Vietnam will increase from next year.

Besides, it must also be acknowledged that despite the increasing demand for cars, motorbikes are still the most popular means of transportation in Vietnam.

In the first six months of this year, 38% of Vietnamese consumers said they planned to buy a motorbike in the next six months, 8.8 percentage points higher than the average of neighboring countries.

According to Tin Tuc Newspaper