Car sales accelerated in January (2)

General Motors, the largest foreign automaker in China in terms of sales, said on Tuesday that it and its joint ventures sold more than 300,000 vehicles in a single month for the first time ever in January.

Sales totaled 310,765 units, an increase of 26 percent from the same month in 2012 and 15.9 percent above the previous all-time monthly high of 268,035 units in January 2011.

Domestic sales by its Chinese ventures Shanghai GM and SAIC-GM-Wuling, and their Buick, Chevrolet and Wuling brands all set single-month records in January.

Though hit seriously by anti-Japanese protests over the Diaoyu Islands that broke out in mid-September, Japanese automakers also reported a sales surge last month.

Toyota Motor Corp said that its January sales in China increased by 23.5 percent over last year to about 72,500 units, the first growth in seven months. However, that was still 8.9 percent lower than the sales in January 2011.

Nissan China reported a January sales jump of 22.2 percent, representing 115,700 units of vehicles delivered in the country, while Honda Motor Co also saw a 22.2 percent sales increase in the month, the first monthly growth since September.

Other than the foreign automakers, China's homegrown brands also benefited from the prosperous market, as most of them reported more than a 10 percent year-on-year sales jump in January, according to Rao.

Warren Buffett-backed BYD Co Ltd said that its sales in January reached 55,800 units, a surge of 85.2 percent from a year earlier.