European new car sales for the month of March up 5.7% to 1.74 million, regardless of 1.6% sales fall for Volkswagen
Despite sales of new Volkswagen cars dropping in March, European car sales rose by 5.7% to 1.74 million.
Data gathered by the European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association seems to suggest that the low sales of VW cars might still be linked to the emissions scandal and the recall of millions of Volkswagen cars.
From January to March 2016, European-wide car sales saw a healthy rise of 8.1% compared to the same period last year – an increase which brought the total sales to 3.932 million.
Growth was recorded in almost every European country during March, apart from Spain where car sales fell by 0.7% and in Europe’s largest car market, Germany, where Volkswagen sales fell by 1.6% in March.
The biggest rise in car sales was recorded in Italy, with a staggering 17.4%, while France saw an overall rise in sales of 7.5%.
EU car sales have risen over the last thirty one months, almost reaching figures close to the ones that were recorded in 2007, just before the car industry was hit by the economic crisis.
The editor at Automotive Industry Data, Peter Schmidt, spoke to the Bloomberg News agency and told them that it seems like the “European car market is recovering much faster than most analysts anticipated – including myself”.
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