World Vehicle Sales Up 3.2% in September

World vehicle sales climbed 3.2% in September, the highest year-over-year monthly gain of 2015, aided by strong demand in North America and Europe. Global automakers delivered 7.685 million units in the month, compared with 7.444 million year-ago, according to WardsAuto data.

North America posted the largest increase, with 227,000 additional deliveries pushing results up 14.7% from year-ago to 1.77 million units, giving it a 24.3% share of global auto sales. September was the 20th consecutive month that the region outpaced prior-year.

Sales in the U.S. rose 15.5% to 1.47 million. Canada and Mexico hit best-ever September results. Deliveries in Canada were up 4.0% to 179,000, and Mexico’s total shot up 24.4% to 114,130 units.

Europe sales were 4.9% better than year-ago, totaling 1.85 million units and accounting for 24.0% of the world tally.

Germany saw vehicle deliveries climb 4.4% in September. The next three biggest markets, the U.K. (+9.9%), France (+9.2%) and Italy (+15.6%) posted greater growth. Russia, however, saw September sales plummet 28.8%.

The Asia-Pacific market grew 1.4% to 3.62 million units in the month, accounting for 47.2% of world vehicle sales.

China sales were up from year-ago for the first time in eight months with a 2.1% gain to 2.02 million vehicles. Japan dropped 7.6%, but growth in India (+5.5%), South Korea (+16.3%) and Australia (+6.8%) kept the regional result positive.

South America accounted for 4.8% of world sales in September. The region posted a sixth consecutive double-digit decline, plummeting 23.2% to 367,000 units. The decrease, which was the second worst in WardsAuto history, was spurred by steep declines in nearly all major markets.

Brazil’s automakers delivered 32.5% fewer vehicles than year-ago. Venezuela showed the sharpest decline, 67.6%. The sole bright spot was Argentina with 10.0% growth.

September’s results brought year-to-date worldwide vehicle sales to 64.92 million units, up 0.7% from like-2014.

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