EU passenger car demand up and down over summer

Brussels – Passenger car registrations fluctuated over the course of the summer, with July seeing a 1.4% year-on-year spike in demand, followed by an 8.4% contraction in August.

In July, demand for new passenger cars increased to almost 1.3 million units across the European Union (EU), according to figures released by The European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association (ACEA) 19 Sept.

Among the five big Western European markets, Germany was the only major car market to post positive results with a 4.7% growth.

The region-wide increase was largely supported by the Central European countries, where registrations went up 13.4% in July.

The market, however, contracted by 8.4% year-over-year in August, mainly due to the high prior-year base of comparison.

Registration rates were up 31.2% year-on-year in August 2018, ahead of the introduction of the new WLTP emissions test on 1 Sept 2018.

This year, top five EU markets all recorded decreases in August, with the biggest drops recorded in Spain at 30.8% and France at 14.1%.

Over the first eight months of the year, new car demand in the EU went down by 3.2% compared to the same period last year, counting 10.5 million registrations in total.

With just under 1% of improvement compared to last year, Germany is the only country among the top five markets – including Spain, the UK, France and Italy – to post a positive trend so far this year.