Europe: slight rise in passenger car sales for 2007
Dynamic development in the new EU countries – stable results in Western Europe – diesels continue to overtake
Frankfurt am Main, 15 January 2008. In 2007, 16 million passenger cars were newly registered in Europe, which was 1 per cent more than in 2006. Sales in Western Europe came to 14.8 million - a stable result. In the new EU member states demand for new cars was exceptionally dynamic, rising by 15 per cent. The German manufacturers successfully maintained their significant growth in market share from the previous year, accounting for around 47 per cent of all vehicles sold in Western Europe. In the new EU countries their share likewise stayed at a high level, at over 44 per cent.
Demand for diesel vehicles in Western Europe was again impressive in the year 2007. It increased by a good 4 per cent, while sales of gasoline cars slackened off by 4 per cent. This means that 53 per cent of the newly registered passenger cars in Western Europe had a diesel engine. This new record illustrates just how highly customers regard the clean diesel, with its active contribution to reducing CO2. The German manufacturers clearly lead in the economical and powerful diesel technology. More than half of all diesel cars sold in Western Europe bears a German group badge.
In France 2.1 million passenger cars were sold in 2007, i.e. 3 per cent more new registrations. Many French customers acted ahead of the reward-and-punishment system introduced at the beginning of 2008 and bought a new car shortly before the end of the year. The domestic producers sold 2 per cent fewer vehicles, thus taking a market share of only 52 per cent (-2 percentage points). By contrast the foreign manufacturers made marked gains in sales. The German manufacturers pushed their sales up by 6 per cent to over 585,000 vehicles. They thus took a market share of more than 28 per cent, which represents growth of 1 percentage point compared to the previous year.
In the United Kingdom the number of new registrations on passenger cars in 2007 came to 2.4 million, which was almost 3 per cent up on the previous year's level. Against the background of strong economic conditions there were positive results both in private demand (+1 per cent) and in sales to business customers (+4 per cent). The proportion of total sales going to private motorists was close to 44 per cent. The German brands did very well on the British market: they sold over 1.1 million vehicles, increasing their sales by 5 per cent. This brought them a market share of 48 per cent, which is a year-on-year rise of over 1 percentage point.
In Italy, new registrations of passenger cars last year amounted to 2.5 million (+7 per cent), a new record. This was boosted by the introduction of a vehicle disposal premium with a two-year tax exemption on the purchase of a new car. The Italian manufacturers in particular benefited from the state subsidy and pushed up their market share by 1 percentage point to over 31 per cent. In the year just ended the German brands also recorded a large increase in sales - of 6 per cent - and were therefore able to retain a more or less constant market share.
New registrations in Spain totaled 1.6 million passenger cars, which was 1 per cent down on the previous year's result. The high rate of inflation held back private demand for passenger cars, which slumped by 6 per cent. By contrast there was growth in business in rental cars (+2 per cent) and in company cars (+7 per cent). At the beginning of the year 2008 the Spanish Government abolished the vehicle disposal premium for end-of-life cars and for this reason it can be expected that sales of new cars in Spain will continue to fall this year.
In the new EU member states sales of passenger cars in the year 2007 showed extremely welcome growth. The number of cars sold came to nearly 1.2 million, i.e. 15 per cent more than in the previous year. Demand for new cars was supported by the continuing brisk consumption and investment activity. With their increasing purchasing power, customers in these counties are more and more frequently satisfying their consistently high demand for replacement vehicles by buying new cars instead of used ones. The "newcomer" Romania has taken over from Poland as the largest market; here passenger car sales climbed by one quarter to 312,500 vehicles, while in Poland sales rose by 23 per cent to 293,300. Hungary was the only country not to match the number of new registrations in 2006, with sales slumping by 8 per cent. The continuing consolidation efforts on the part of the Government led to rises in taxes and prices, and as a consequence to a considerable drop in demand.
