As a "barometer" of the economy, excavator sales in October hit the largest decline in the year, and the traditional peak season of golden nine and silver ten did not appear. However, the export growth rate of excavators has reached a new high in a single month, and there is a phenomenon of "ice and fire" in the excavator market at home and abroad.
In addition to the base factor, weak demand, real estate regulation, weak infrastructure and rising prices of raw materials are all important reasons for the decline in domestic excavator sales. Towards the end of the year, favorable factors supporting investment recovery are increasing, and domestic excavator demand is expected to improve.
According to the statistics of 25 excavator manufacturers by China Construction Machinery Industry Association, 18964 excavators of various types were sold in October 2021, a year-on-year decrease of 30.6%; Including 12608 sets in China, a year-on-year decrease of 47.2%; 6356 sets were exported, a year-on-year increase of 84.8%.
From January to October 2021, 298302 excavators were sold, with a year-on-year increase of 13.1%; Including 244920 sets in China, with a year-on-year increase of 3.47%; 53382 sets were exported, a year-on-year increase of 96.8%.
The data show that after the total sales volume of excavators reached the peak of 79000 units in March, the sales volume fell from April to July, respectively 46600 units, 27000 units, 23100 units and 17300 units; From August to September, the sales volume was positively affected by the export market and rebounded month on month; In October, the total sales volume decreased slightly by 10000 units month on month.
In October, excavator sales continued to grow negatively year-on-year, which was the "seven consecutive declines" in domestic excavator sales year-on-year since April, and the largest decline this year. In contrast to foreign orders, the export volume continued to grow year-on-year, and the overseas market was hot.
Luo Zhiheng, vice president and chief Macro Analyst of YueKai Securities Research Institute, said in an interview with reporters that the export of excavators has maintained a high growth since the fourth quarter of last year. First, strong overseas demand, low interest rate policies in Europe and the United States and home office have led to a hot real estate market and accelerated the construction of new houses; Second, the recovery of overseas production is slow, and a large number of orders are transferred to China.
According to Luo Zhiheng's analysis, excavator sales mainly rely on the domestic market, and domestic excavator sales mainly depend on real estate and infrastructure investment. Affected by the continuous tightening of real estate regulation, real estate investment has continued to decline since April; Affected by the strengthened supervision of local government debt and the slow progress of special debt issuance, infrastructure investment continued to be depressed. Therefore, the sales volume of domestic excavators increased negatively for 7 consecutive months, dragging down the overall sales volume for 6 consecutive months.
The anti seasonal decline in excavator sales in October may also be due to the flood disaster in some parts of the north and the reduction of engineering construction caused by the debt default of many domestic real estate enterprises.
Zheshang Securities pointed out that the centralized and accelerated issuance of special bonds will strongly support the promotion of major infrastructure projects in the fourth quarter of this year and the first quarter of next year. It is expected that the growth rate of domestic excavator sales may recover in the fourth quarter.
The Ministry of Finance previously said that the new amount of special bonds in 2021 should be issued as far as possible before the end of November, so as to continue to give full play to the positive role of special bonds in local economic and social development.
Luo Zhiheng also believes that excavator sales are expected to improve from the end of the year to the beginning of next year. First, the sales in the fourth quarter is usually better than that in the third quarter, and it is the peak sales season of the whole year after the lunar new year; Second, the progress of issuing special bonds has been accelerated. The central government requires that physical workload be formed as soon as possible and infrastructure investment pick up.
Ming Ming, chief ficc analyst of CITIC Securities, said that there are multiple positive factors in infrastructure investment from the end of this year to the beginning of next year, including the requirements for the formation of physical workload, the logic of steady growth and counter cycle, sufficient sources of funds, large elasticity of investment projects, etc. supported by these factors, the growth rate of infrastructure investment is expected to rebound at the end of the year.
Mingming estimates that the main variables of capital sources of infrastructure investment are self raised funds and funds in the government budget. It is estimated that there is more than 500 billion incremental space in the fourth quarter. Compared with the scale of infrastructure investment of 50000 ~ 6 trillion in the fourth quarter of last year, it may correspond to a year-on-year growth space of about 10%.
Since November, a number of major projects have been launched in Hubei, Shenzhen and other places, with a total of more than 1000 projects started and a total investment of more than trillion yuan. The projects cover many fields such as infrastructure, people's livelihood security, ecological environmental protection and so on.
In order to give play to the important role of infrastructure investment in steady growth, the national development and Reform Commission recently said that it would accelerate the issuance and use of 3.65 trillion yuan of special bonds of local governments throughout the year, and promote the physical workload of major projects and basic livelihood projects as soon as possible. Give full play to the leading role of 102 major projects proposed in the outline of the 14th five year plan, accelerate the implementation progress of the investment plan within the central budget, and strengthen the promotion of project construction.
