green book editorial May 2018

It would appear from observations that the “start” of the 2018 season stalled and is a month late. Well that’s the word on the street and Met Office data would suggest there is a reason. A good start to the year in both new and used sectors went a little off track as new plate deliveries got delayed and in some cases the part exchanges not finding their way into dealerships altered the used stock volumes.

New Market

The end of the first quarter has been reported in the latest MCIA new registration numbers and as time moves on the state of the market should become clearer. Total registrations were up 4.7% at 15,208 for the month and the year-to-date 24,609 sold in 2018 is an increase of 5.6% over 2017.  Drilling down into a bit more detail we see the usual negative Moped result has not improved, with over a third less in the month and close to a quarter less Y-T-D. The rest of the sectors have had a better time of it, with only Trail and Sports Tour in a negative position, but as they are relatively smaller sectors, the loss of units is not too bad. Interestingly the latter is the only one in a minus position Y-T-D, are we seeing the first trend of the year? Most of the other sectors are not seeing any particular market share jump from the month figures to the first three-month ones, although Adventure Sport had a minor spike, but as the new plate indicates the start of the season and thoughts turn to longer distance, multi day jaunts. This perhaps comes as little surprise as the decline seen in pure Touring types seen over the last couple of years have been replaced by Adventure models that are in a lot of cases a crossover from Naked/Touring and perform a multi roll.

March 2018 and Year to Date - New Registrations by Style

Mopeds	Registrations		%	Market Share (%)		Year to date			YTD	Market Share (%)
	Mar-18	Mar-17	Change	Mar-18	Mar-17		2018	2017	% Change	2018	2017
Scooter	330	530	-37.7%	86.6%	88.5%		930	1,311	-29.1%	84.5%	91.4%
Other	51	69	-26.1%	13.4%	11.5%		171	124	37.9%	15.5%	8.6%
Totals	381	599	-36.4%	100.0%	100.0%		1,101	1,435	-23.3%	100.0%	100.0%

In the engine band table we see a mixed bag of results with the mid-sized 126-650cc machine shaving a large increase over the same monthly period last year at 55.8%, but interestingly also a large jump in market share both for the month and the Y-T-D. The next size up is the one that suffers significant losses for both the month and the first quarter. A point of note though when discussing the market share of the two, is that the position in the previous year was the opposite in both cases. Are we still seeing the back end of Euro 4 fall out and comparison is still a bit difficult as it is not like-for-like?

March 2018 and Year to Date - New Registrations by Engine Band

Engine Band	Registrations		%	Market Share (%)		Year to date		YTD	Market Share (%)
	Mar-18	Mar-17	Change	Mar-18	Mar-17	2018	2017	% Change	2018	2017
0-50cc	427	611	-30.1%	2.8%	4.2%	1,161	1,460	-20.5%	4.7%	6.3%
51-125cc	3,375	3,270	3.2%	22.2%	22.5%	6,935	6,755	2.7%	28.2%	29.0%
126-650cc	3,390	2,176	55.8%	22.3%	15.0%	5,475	3,754	45.8%	22.2%	16.1%
651-1000cc	3,891	4,512	-13.8%	25.6%	31.1%	5,400	6,109	-11.6%	21.9%	26.2%
Over 1000cc	4,125	3,962	4.1%	27.1%	27.3%	5,638	5,235	7.7%	22.9%	22.5%
Total Registrations	15,208	14,531	4.7%	100.0%	100.0%	24,609	23,313	5.6%	100.0%	100.0%

March 2018 and Year to Date - Highest Registering Model by Style

Mopeds	Highest Registering Model by style	Mar-18
Scooter	Yamaha AEROX 50	22
Other	Lexmoto HUNTER 50 TD 50 Q	11

Motorcycles	Highest Registering Model by style	Mar-18
Adventure Sport	BMW R 1200 GS	405
Custom	Honda CMX 500 REBEL	123
Naked	Kawasaki Z900 RS	238
Scooter	Honda NSC 110 WH	327
Sport/Tour	Kawasaki Z1000 SX	208
Supersport	Honda CBR 650 F	178
Touring	BMW R 1200 RT	159
TRAIL/ENDURO	Honda CRF 250 LA	74

Tricycles	Highest Registering Model by style	Mar-18
SCOOTER	Piaggio MP3 300 YOURBAN LT	26
OTHER	Multiple Items	7

March 2018 - Highest Registering Model by Engine Size

Engine Band	Highest Registering Model by Engine Band	Mar-18
0-50cc	Torrot MUVI	25
51-125cc	Honda NSC 110 WH	327
126-650cc	Honda CBR 650 F	178
651-1000cc	Honda CRF 1000	249
Over 1000cc	BMW R 1200 GS	405

March 2018 - New Registrations by Brand

Major Brands	Mar-18
Honda	2,869
BMW	1,938
Kawasaki	1,659
Yamaha	1,534
Triumph	1,348
Suzuki	1,060
Harley-Davidson	821
KTM	657
Ducati	536
SYM	327

Although the names in the top ten manufacturers are not throwing up many surprises, the order in which they appear is a little different from the “norm”. As the time of the year as mentioned above is the start of touring season and more the leisure rider type of purchase time, it should come as little surprise that we see Yamaha slipping from the usual second spot as there is a large number of lower capacity models in the line-up. The similar thinking could also be used when seeing the likes of BMW and Kawasaki higher than usual. There is a similar story if looking back to last year.

Used Market

After a buoyant start to the year, again the climate in March slowed the business of used sales, but reports from research is suggesting the obvious. As the nights draw out and the thermometer moves up, there has been an increase in activity, although feedback is suggesting “not as good as it could be”. Consequently the initial rush to source stock that happens in the opening months of the year has calmed and with the swappers from new plate sales swelling adding to the availability, opinion is for more level pricing when comparing to the previous month. There are some anomalies that crop up when asking opinion from dealers who manage to feed their desire for stock locally, via further sales or cash buys within shops and auction buyers. Auction purchases are a result of not enough stock coming through the doors, so filling holes becomes more urgent and subsequently at certain times of year auction prices are higher. Research from many avenues taken into consideration have led to static reported prices for this month’s edition, with of course, a few alterations where research suggests it is necessary.

Auction

As there is a Black Horse disposal every month this year and another sale added at BCA Peterborough, it throws up some anomalies when looking at the results. But as the middle of the month sale consists predominantly of the “big” sales leftovers, there is little surprise that when compared to Green Book figures there is differences in the results between the two. The larger sale that included 60 from the main finance house contributor, sold 78% (125/160) of the entries and overall the sale returned 103% of CAP figures. As always it is very noticeable that the on-line bids that include Euro Zone bidders are always the strongest, pushing up prices. The mid-month sale in this last research period with a much reduced entry of 40, sold 44% and returned 93% of CAP. In the MAG sale in Rotherham after a rush for stock at the beginning of the year saw some very robust prices achieved, as used examples start to become more available, prices have settled a little to a level where dealers researched in the showroom environment are closer too. As the season is in full swing it comes as little surprise that the quality should ease a little, as dealers want the best on sales floors. That said there was still a lot of good entries that got snapped up to the tune of 74% selling from the 106 offered. At 102% the average difference from CAP was £56.

End Notes

The rise of BMW’s motorcycle division continues as the 2017 results are made public. Records have again been broken for revenue, profit, production and bike numbers. Revenue from bikes grew by 10.3% (to £1.993bn), associated operating profit was 10.7% up (at £180.7m) and pre-tax profit rose by 10.8% (to £179m). Motorcycle and scooter production had increased by 27.6% (to 185,682 units) and global retail sales volume was 13.2% up (to 164,153). In Europe, with the lion’s share of global sales, a first time six figure total saw a 15.4% increase (to 101,524). In their domestic market, Germany remained its biggest, 7.1% up (at 26,664), France the largest growth up 24.4% to (16,607) and Italy rounding off the top three up by 17.3% (to 14,430). In Spain where the economy has been a long term cause for concern, as with the total market on the up, the brand saw 17.6% more (to 11,193). As with the rest of the market in across the pond, US sales lost a bit of ground, reducing by 1.3% (to 13,546), although this was still better than the overall market decline of 3.2%.

A name that keeps cropping in the industry is Erik Buell, a name that has never shied away from looking outside the box for solutions to making a better motorcycle. So when his name is associated with something new, there is a chance someone will listen. Ok electric bikes are nothing new, but it would be a bet with short odds that there will not be some sort of a new approach thrown at the subject. VanguardSpark has been formed by the above with F-X Terny (Vanguard Motorcycles) and Frédéric Vasseur (Spark Racing Technology) of Formula-E electric racing cars fame. Still at the drawing stage there has been two models mentioned. An alternative to moped/small scooter, electric bicycle and a bike that looks like its brimming with technology, no surprise there.

Ducati has been up there on safety for riders, including riding gear that talks to the bike and cornering ABS. The constant drive towards innovation, have led the Bologna-based manufacturer to define its safety strategy until 2025. In the short term ARAS (Advanced Rider Assistance Systems) on Ducati motorcycles is on the cards. Advanced assistance systems increase rider safety levels via a number of sensors, including radars. These, in particular, are able to provide feedback on the surrounding environment - helping to prevent possible collisions with obstacles or other vehicles by alerting the rider. In conjunction with the Department of Electronics, Information and Bioengineering of the Politecnico di Milano University the study has led to the development of a warning system based on a rear radar, able to identify and point out vehicles present in the "blind spot" (i.e. the section of the road not visible either directly or in the rear-view mirror), or traffic approaching at high speed from behind. To highlight the technical and scientific value of this research project, developed by Ducati employees, University researchers and undergraduates, in May 2017 a patent application was filed concerning the system control algorithms, and a Scientific Publication was presented at the IEEE - Intelligent Vehicles Symposium (IV) on June 11-14, 2017, at Redondo Beach, CA, USA.

Good news finish that must help in the raising of the positive profile for motorcycling in general, is that it had just been revealed that 2017 was a good one for the Nationwide Association of Blood Bikes. Member groups completed a record 73,617 runs. This was a 30% increase on 2016 and nearly triple the amount of runs in 2012. Increased support means the NABB has now expanded to over 3000 volunteers with a fleet that includes 260 motorcycles and cars. Had it not been for Blood Bikes, health trusts would have had to pay for taxis or courier services, costing the NHS hundreds of thousands of pounds.