Figures released by the European carmakers’ association, ACEA, show that Western Europe new passenger car registrations in October reached 1,178,506 units, a decline of 2.2 % on last year. Cumulative figures for the period January to October 2002 show a decrease of 3.6% over the same period last year.
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Among the larger markets, the October figures show small declines in the United Kingdom (-0.6 %) and Germany (-1.1 %). Larger declines were evident in Italy (-3.9 %) and France (-5.1 %). Italy’s decline comes in spite of government incentives there, raising the suspicion that they are of only limited benefit in supporting car demand.
The ACEA figures are in line with the figures issued by LMC/JD Power last week (published by just-auto).
Besides the finalisation of some figures that may be provisional in LMC/JD Power’s monthly analysis, the ACEA figures provide additional manufacturer detail.
The Japanese carmakers enjoyed a relatively strong October with sales up by 10.6% being underpinned by especially buoyant sales from Honda (+25.5%) and Mazda (+54.6%).
Market leader Volkswagen Group was down by just 1.4% in October, with declines for the Volkswagen and Audi brands partially compensated by gains for Seat and Skoda.
PSA sales were up 3.1% in October, boosted by the Citroen division (+16.1%).
BMW and Ford saw marginal sales drops in October, but GM’s sales were off 2.4% over last year and Renault was down 7.2%.
Fiat Group again emerged as a major loser, with October sales down by 16.2% on last year. In the first ten months, Fiat Group sales are 18.1% off the same period of last year.
See the figures at www.acea.be under ‘press releases’.
