Data from ACEA shows that in May, the European passenger car market (EU+EFTA+UK) suffered another sharp drop, with new registrations falling by 57.2% on last year to 1,305,755 units. The figure is nevertheless a significant improvement on April’s drop of 79.8%. ACEA’s data is in line with that from LMC Automotive published on just-auto earlier this month.
Double-digit declines were recorded in each of the 27 EU markets last month, even though the percentage drops were less dramatic than in April. Spain saw the biggest decline among the four major EU markets (-72.7%), while sales fell by roughly half in France (-50.3%), Italy (-49.6%) and Germany (-49.5%) while the UK market was down 89%.
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From January to May 2020, European demand for new passenger cars (EU+EFTA+UK) contracted by 43.5% to 3.57m units.
Analysts say the sharp May drop was expected, with many countries in the region still in partial lockdowns due to the COVID-19 crisis.
However, it is expected that markets will continue their long climb from the depths of recession during the second half, boosted also by purchase incentives and scrappage incentives in major markets such as France, Italy and Spain.
Nevertheless, GlobalData forecasts that the European light vehicle market turn out down 23.2% this year at 15.8 million units. That’s a much bigger drop than occurred during the international financial crisis of a decade ago.
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By GlobalDataSee also: West European car market down 57.3% in May
