The so-called "December 1 effect," which significantly affected the structure of supplies from China and led to a drop in imports from South Korea, had virtually no impact on car imports from Japan. This is evidenced by statistical data from the Avtostat agency.
In December, a record number of used car imports from Japan was recorded (23.6 thousand units) over the past 2.5 years. The only higher spike was in July 2024 (28 thousand units). The January import volume (12,553 units) is 22% higher than in January last year (10,310 units)
An analysis of the most popular models shows that the demand structure changed only slightly. Before December, the leaders were Honda Freed (8.3%), Honda Fit (6.7%), Toyota Corolla (5.5%), Honda Stepwgn (5.3%), and Toyota Yaris (4.0%). After December, the top five most in-demand cars look as follows: Honda Freed (8.1%), Honda Stepwgn (7.0%), Honda Fit (7.0%), Toyota Corolla (5.6%), and Suzuki Jimny (4.7%). The only notable change was the appearance of the compact SUV Suzuki Jimny in the top 5.