Domestic sales of cars, trucks and buses -- but excluding minivehicles with engine displacements smaller than 660cc -- rose 4.1 percent year-on-year in August to 243,088 units, the first increase in two months, the Japan Automobile Dealers Association said Friday.
By category, sales of regular cars with engine displacements larger than 2,000cc rose 6.5 percent to 43,938 units, while sales of smaller cars increased 6.2 percent to 128,281 vehicles.
Sales of trucks with a capacity of 3.4 tons or more decreased 8.6 percent to a record low of 5,672 units, down for the second consecutive month, but sales of smaller trucks, including multipurpose vehicles and sport utility vehicles, rose 0.2 percent to 64,198 units, up for the fourth consecutive month.
Bus sales fell 5.4 percent to 999 units, down for the second consecutive month.
Toyota Motor Corp. increased sales of new vehicles by 14.9 percent from a year earlier to 102,239 units, while Honda Motor Co. and Mazda Motor Corp. also saw sales rise by more than 5 percent.
However, Nissan Motor Co.'s sales fell 13.6 percent to 40,853 units and Mitsubishi Motors Corp.'s sales declined 2.7 percent to 16,769 units.
Domestic sales of minivehicles in August decreased 2.1 percent from a year earlier to 119,697 units, down for the second consecutive month, the Japan Minivehicles Association said Friday.