Cars and Drivers

European Auto Sales Down by 32% in First 8 Months of 2020

Paul Ausick

Published: September 17, 2020 7:36 am

The European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) reported that new registrations (a proxy for sales) in August fell by 18.9% year over year. For the first eight months of the year, sales are down 32% in the European Union.

While August’s sales decline was worse than July’s, it is far better than the year-over-year decline of 76.3% posted in March. Sales increased in just one of the 27 EU countries: Cyprus posted a gain of 14.1% year over year, from 639 sales in August 2019 to 729 in August 2020.

Among the EU’s major market, year-to-date sales have fallen by 40.6% in Spain, by 38.9% in Italy, 32% in France and 28.8% in Germany. The United Kingdom has seen a year-over-year sales drop of 38.9%.

Through the first eight months of 2020, U.S. new vehicle sales are down about 23%.

Of the Detroit carmakers that still sell vehicles in Europe, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. (NYSE: FCAU) saw its August market share there increase from 5.4% in 2019 to 6.2%. Unit sales totaled 47,989, down by 6.6% year over year. Sales of the Fiat brand slipped by 3.5%, while Jeep sales fell by 11.6%. For the year to date, FCA held EU market share of 6.3%, down from 7.0% in 2019.

Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) sold 40,385 units in August, a year-over-year decrease of 16.5% for the month. The company’s August market share rang in at 5.2%, up from 5.1% a year ago. For the year to date, Ford sales have fallen by 37.1% to 306,813 units, and the company’s market share dropped from 5.4% to 5.0%.

The top-selling automaker in the EU (excluding the United Kingdom) is Volkswagen, which sold 196,794 vehicles in August, down 24.3% year over year for the month, and market share also declined from 27.4% a year ago to 25.6%. For the first eight months of the year, VW sold 1.6 million vehicles in the EU, a decrease of 29.8% in volume.

PSA Group, makers of Peugeot and Citroen, among other brands, posted an August sales decrease of 20.1% to 110,112 units. The company’s market share dropped from 14.6% to 14.3% for the month and from 16.9% to 15.3% for the year to date.

Renault Group posted a volume decrease of 24.7% to 82,955 units in August, and its year-over-year share slipped from 11.6% to 10.8%. For the year to date, volume fell by 34.5%, while the company’s market share dropped from 11.9% to 11.5%.

BMW Group’s market share increased year over year from 5.2% in April 2019 to 6.9%. The company sold 52,965 units last month, up by 6.8% compared with March of last year. For the first eight months of 2020, BMW’s share has increased from 5.6% to 6.6%.

Daimler’s market share dipped last month 6.9% in August 2019 to 6.8% this year. Volume dropped by 20% year over year to 52,000 units. For the year to date, volume has decreased by 29.1% and the company’s market share has increased from 5.8% in 2019 to 6.0%.

Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) posted market share of 5.9% in August, up from 5.0% a year ago. Sales volume fell by just 4.0% to 45,154 units. For the year to date, Toyota sales have dropped by 21.5% and its market share has increased from 5.8% to 6.0%.