World Vehicle Sales Up 0.5% in First Half

Global vehicle sales rose 0.5% in the first six months of 2015 with 43.7 million units sold, the largest first-half volume on record.

Deliveries in South America continued to plummet in June, bringing the year-to-date total to just 2.2 million units for the first half of the year, a 16.5% drop from the same period in 2014.

Brazil, the region’s largest market, witnessed a sharp decline with sales down 19.6%. Chile, Colombia and Uruguay also posted substantial declines in the first six months of the year, down 20.7%, 5.7% and 8.3%, respectively. Venezuela was the sole bright spot, growing 33.2% from last year, but accounted for only 0.5% of the regional total.

Vehicle sales in the Asia-Pacific region also were down from prior-year, but to a much lower extent. Deliveries hit 20.9 million vehicles, slipping just 0.9%.

The regional total was brought down by Indonesia (-18.2%), Japan (-11.0%) and Thailand (-16.3%). China sold 11.9 million vehicles in the first half of the year, rising 1.5% above the 11.7 million vehicles sold in first-half 2014. The countries with the greatest growth – Pakistan, Singapore and Vietnam – also had the smallest market share.

Deliveries in North America totaled 10.3 million units through the first half, up 5.4% from like-2014. The region recorded year-over-year gains in every month of 2014.

The U.S. and Canada both witnessed modest growth, up 4.7% and 2.8%, respectively, while Mexico sales surged 21.5% from year-ago.

A 10.2% jump in June sales lifted the 6-month total for Europe to 9.9 million vehicles, 3.4% higher than last year.

Germany (+5.2%), the U.K. (+8.7%), France (+5.3%) and Italy (+14.6), the largest European markets, bolstered vehicle sales in the region, while Russian deliveries fell 36.0% through June.

At the current growth rate, global vehicle sales would top 90.6 million units by year-end.

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