Forget about clinging to hopes that China, the world’s largest car market, will recover from its unprecedented two-year slump anytime soon.
Expectations were already bleak as the year began, with IHS Markit predicting a 10% drop in first-quarter production. Now, the influential research firm sees a scenario in which the coronavirus spreading rapidly across the country triggers a cascade of plant closings that lasts into mid-March and reduces output by more than 1.7 million cars — a decline of another 32%.
