China’s automobile industry recorded moderate profit growth in 2025, as rising costs and intense competition continued to weigh on margins, according to data released by Cui Dongshu, secretary general of the China Passenger Car Association (CPCA).
Total vehicle production from January to December rose 10% year-on-year to 34.78 million units, while industry revenue increased 7.1% to 11.18 trillion yuan, Cui said.
However, total costs grew faster, rising 8.1% to 9.85 trillion yuan, resulting in total industry profit of 461 billion yuan, up 0.6% from a year earlier. The overall profit margin stood at 4.1%, below the 5.9% average for downstream industrial enterprises.
Profitability weakened sharply at the end of the year. In December, industry revenue fell 0.8% year-on-year to 1.16 trillion yuan, while costs rose 0.8%. Monthly profit dropped 57.4% to 20.7 billion yuan, pushing the profit margin down to 1.8%, compared with 4.1% in the same month a year earlier.
Cui also noted that by the end of 2025, accounts receivable at above-scale industrial firms totaled 27.43 trillion yuan, up 4.7% year-on-year, while finished goods inventories increased 3.9% to 6.73 trillion yuan. He added that inventory reduction and improvements in payment cycles in the auto sector appeared better than the overall industrial average.
(Note: 1 U.S. dollar equals 7 Chinese yuan.)
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