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Global vehicle sales totaled 8.87 million units in March, beating the all-time 1-month high, set in the same year-ago period, of 8.62 million by 2.8%.
Strong demand again was seen in Europe, where sales climbed 4.4% above year-ago with 2.24 million deliveries. Europe’s first-quarter total of 5.07 million vehicles outpaced same-period 2015 by 5.7%.
March tends to be a big month for many countries, including the U.K., which accounted for more than a fourth of Europe’s total with 590,000 units. Sales also were up in France (+7.3%), Italy (+18.5%) and Portugal (+33.5%).
Russia’s decline may be leveling, with last month’s total just 10.7% behind year-ago, the smallest year-over-year loss since December 2014.
North America sales reached 1.92 million units, 4% higher than year-ago and equal to a 21.7% share of the world tally. Each country in the region saw improvement: the U.S. was up 3.0%, Canada sales spiked 8.4% and deliveries in Mexico surged 11.9%.
Sales were back up overall in the Asia-Pacific region with 4.29 million vehicles sold, an increase of 3.4% from year-ago, despite downturns in a few countries. Robust growth in Singapore (+70.9%) and India (+8.7%) made up for slow sales in Japan (-8.6%), South Korea (-1.0%) and Taiwan (-48.3%).
Driven by tax cuts and other incentives, consumers in China purchased an estimated 2.44 million vehicles, 9.0% higher than year-ago.
The Asia-Pacific region’s first-quarter tally was 2.5% above same-period 2015 with 11.32 million units, earning a 50.3% share of world sales.
Global growth was dampened by a steep decline in South America, where March sales sank 16.4% to just 322,000 units. The region held only 4.0% of the worldwide total with 889,000 units year-to-date, falling 20.4% below first-quarter 2015.
Amid government shutdowns and drought, automakers in Venezuela delivered only 217 vehicles, a fraction of the nearly 4,000 vehicles sold last March. Sales in Brazil, which is suffering from political turmoil, plummeted 23.6% to 179,000 units. Argentina (+13.5%) and Chile (+6.7%) continued to be the sole bright spots in the region.
Worldwide, 22.49 million vehicles were sold through March, up 2.4% from same-period 2015.
