South Korea's foreign car import posts double-digit fall in April

SEOUL: Foreign luxury car import in South Korea posted a double-digit fall last month on shortage of new models, keeping a downward trend for the fourth consecutive month, industry data showed Tuesday.

The number of newly registered foreign vehicles was 18,219 in April, down 29.7 percent from a year earlier, according to the Korea Automobile Importers & Distributors Association (KAIDA).

The reduction came amid the shortage of newly launched models, manufactured by major foreign luxury brands. It continued to slide since January.

During the January-April period, the foreign car sales tumbled 24.6 percent to 70,380 units compared with the same period of last year.

The best-selling brand was German carmaker Mercedes-Benz, which sold 6,543 vehicles last month. It was followed by another German automaker BMW with the sale of 3,226 units and Japanese brand Lexus with 1,452 vehicles sold here.

European brands accounted for 70.3 percent of the total imported car sale in April, trailed by Japanese models with a market share of 19.4 percent and U.S. brands with 10.3 percent of share.