European Market Putting Brakes on Lengthy Sales Skid

PARIS – The long-awaited turnaround in Europe’s automotive market seems to have arrived in September, with its main beneficiaries including Renault, whose sales climbed 22.2%, and BMW, which surpassed Fiat in volume.

Registrations totaled 1,159,066 units, up 5.4% from September 2012, the worst in this century, according to European automakers’ group the ACEA. Before the 2008 crisis, September sales in the region averaged about 1.4 million units.

September 2013 had one more working day than in the prior year, which would take away some of the joy and much of the percentage if people paid attention to it.

“Still,” says Carlos Da Silva, manager-European light-vehicle sales forecast for IHS Automotive, “this should not hide that the situation is clearly improving throughout the region. On sheer volumes, Europe is not in a brilliant shape. Yet the underlying trend of the market is calling for a certain dose of optimism.”

Year-to-date sales were down 3.9% from 2012, but that score has been improving since summer.

Three of the five big markets saw gains in September: France (up 3.4%), the U.K. (up 12.1%) and Spain (up 28.5%). The other leading markets didn’t slip much: Germany was down 1.2% and Italy was off 2.9%.

Of the 26 countries reporting sales in the European Union, 18 had more registrations last month than in like-2012. Renault-brand sales climbed 17.5% and Dacia surged 40.7% compared with September 2012, when the strong-selling new Clio, Captur and Dacia Sandero were not available.

Robert Bosch, one of the industry’s leading suppliers, expects the whole fourth quarter to show improvement over a weak 2012, Guy Maugis, president of Bosch France, says at the Equip Auto show here. But for next year, Bosch expects nothing better in Europe than “weak growth.”

PSA Peugeot Citroen (-2.9%) and Fiat (-3.4%) were the only two high-volume automakers to lose sales in September. Volkswagen (+5.4%), General Motors (+5.3%) and Ford (+5.4%) all rose with the market.

BMW had a particularly good month, with sales of 85,988 units, up 6.3% from a year earlier. BMW outsold Fiat by 22,000 units in the month and passed its Italian rival in total volume year-to-date. Despite BMW’s gains, VW subsidiary Audi remained Europe’s top luxury brand by a wide margin.

Only a handful of brands lost sales in September: Peugeot, Citroen, Lancia/Chrysler, Alfa Romeo, Honda and Smart. Besides the two Renault brands, the big winner in terms of percentage growth was Mazda, jumping 29.9%.

Year-to-date, Dacia was the fastest-growing brand in Europe, up 20.6%. Three other brands saw double-digit sales increases compared with year-ago: Jaguar (+16.5%), Mazda (+11.0%) and SEAT (+10.1%).

Brands down more than 10% after nine months were Alfa Romeo (-29.6%), Lancia/Chrysler (-23.1%), Lexus (-20.7%), Chevrolet (-20.3%) and Jeep (-18.2%).