European Registrations Down

(Thursday 18 October 2012)

Industry analyst JATO Dynamics has gloomy news about the European car market, saying that registrations were down by 11.2% last month compared with September 2011, while the year-to-date figure of 9,749,100 is down 7.3%.

Of the five biggest markets (in descending order, Germany, France, the UK, Italy and Spain) only this country is doing better than it was last year. In Germany, by far, the dominant market, 10.9% fewer cars were registered last month than in the previous September, but German brands are still dominating the scene.

Especially the Volkswagen Golf. Even though it's not as popular as it was, it's still well ahead of the Ford Fiesta, and the arrival of a seventh-generation model isn't going to hurt. Volkswagen itself has shifted more than 1.2 million units so far this year. That's half a million than VW's nearest competitor, Ford, has managed in the same period. Vauxhall/Opel is third, and only then do first Peugeot and then Renault get a look in.

BMW was the only top-ten brand to experience significant growth in September with 9.0%, though Audi managed a 0.2% improvement. On longer scales, Audi is doing better. It's 6.0% ahead for the third quarter, 5.2% for the first nine months of the year.