European car market down 16%, electric loses one third of volume
27.8 per cent fewer registrations in Germany and 24.3 per cent fewer in France. Acea: 'EU shifts CO2 cut targets from 2025 to 2027'
2' min read
2' min read
There was a setback in August for the European car market, which lost 16.5% in volumes compared to August 2023, a drop of 29.6% when compared to 2019, the year before the pandemic crisis. This is a result that also downgrades the market's performance since the beginning of the year: registrations remain positive, but only by 1.7% in the Europe plus Efta area, while the French and German markets in the eight months recorded -0.5% and -0.3% respectively over 2023. Compared to pre-crisis levels, the sector's volumes show a 20% gap.
Particularly negative in the month were the results recorded in Germany, which saw registrations drop by 27.8% compared to August 2023, followed by France (-24.3%) and Italy itself (-13.4%). The other two largest markets recorded smaller decreases, with the UK down 1.3% and Spain -6.5%.
Pressing for new relief measures
.At the same time as the release of the August market data, Acea, the association of car manufacturers, is officially asking the European institutions 'to come up with urgent relief measures before the new CO2 targets for cars and vans come into force in 2025'. The manufacturers' second request concerns the possibility for the Commission to 'bring forward the revisions of the CO2 regulations for light and heavy duty vehicles, currently scheduled for 2026 and 2027 respectively, to 2025'.
Among the automotive groups, both Volkswagen (-13.3%) and Stellantis (-28.7%) ended the month in negative territory, but the Germans remained at +1.2% year-to-date from January to 2023 thanks to the performance of Skoda and Seat while Stellantis dropped 3.2% despite the positive results of Citroen and Jeep. The Renault Group recorded negative volumes in the month the positive since the beginning of the year (+1.8%) and defended its market share (9.7%) while among brands, only Volvo made progress in the month and over the whole period.
The negative result in August was affected by the trend in the market for electric cars (Bev), which fell by 36% in the month, with negative peaks of 68.8% in Germany, 40.9% in Italy, 33.1% in France and 24.8% in Spain, while the United Kingdom recorded growth (+10.8%), probably due, points out Centro Studi Promotor, to "the strong discounts applied by dealers to dispose of stocks of electric cars".
