Cars and Drivers

As European Auto Sales Rise 3.4% in 2017, FCA Outsells Ford

Paul Ausick

Published: January 17, 2018 9:35 am

Last Updated: January 12, 2020 4:25 am

The European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) reported Wednesday that new vehicle registrations in the European Union (EU) dropped by 4.9% in December compared with new registrations in December of 2016. New registrations for the month totaled 1.09 million units. New registrations rose by 5.9% in November.

For the full year, new car demand rose by 3.4% in the EU, reaching 15.14 million units. The country posting the highest growth rate in 2017 was Lithuania (27.3%), followed by Hungary (20.4%), Bulgaria (18.5%) and Croatia (17.2%). By volume, sales in Germany reached 3.35 million units, up 2.7% from 2016, and sales in the United Kingdom totaled 2.69 million, down 5.7%. France, Italy and Spain were the only other countries to see sales above a million units in 2017.

In 2016, total sales for the 27 EU members came to 14.64 million, 6.8% higher compared with 2015 unit sales.

In the month of December, Germany was the volume leader with more than 253,000 units sold, followed by France with sales of more than 193,000, the United Kingdom with sales of nearly 152,500 and Italy with sales of just over 121,000. All those totals, however, were lower than volume sales in December 2016.

The top-selling maker in the EU is Volkswagen, which sold 254,091 vehicles in December, down 4% year over year. VW’s market share for the month totaled 23.3%, up from 23.1% in December 2016. Registrations were up 2.3% for the 2017 to 3.58 million units.

PSA Group, makers of Peugeot and Citroen among other brands, posted a December sales increase of 61.1% to 167,087 units. The company’s market share rose from 9.1% to 15.4%. The increase includes sales in the Opel/Vauxhall group the company acquired from General Motors Co. (NYSE: GM) earlier this year. For the year, PSA sales rose 28.2% to 1.85 million units.

Renault Group posted a volume decrease of 4.5% to 141,142 units in December, while its year-over-year share rose from 12.9% in December 2016 to 13%. For the year, volume sales totaled 1.6 million units, an increase of 6.7%.

Of the Detroit Three, Fiat Chrysler Automobiles N.V. (NYSE: FCAU) saw its market share in the EU dip from 6.3% in December 2016 to 5.6% this year. Unit sales dropped 16.2% for the month but rose 4.9% for the year to 1.025 million units.

Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) sold 68,105 units in December, down 7% year over year. The company’s December market share came to 6.3%, down 0.1 percentage points compared with last year. For 2017, Ford sold 1.011 million units in the EU, down 0.2% year over year.

GM has effectively left the EU market and had sales of just 45 units in December and about 590,000 for the year.

BMW Group’s market share in December rose from 7.2% a year ago to 7.9%. The company sold 86,309 units last month and nearly 998,000 units for the year, an increase of 0.9% compared with 2016.

Daimler posted a market share drop, from 6.4% in December 2016 to 6.1% last month with sales totaling 66,500 units. For the year, Daimler sold more than 953,000 units, 4.8% higher than in 2016.

Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) posted a market share of 4.5% in December, up from 4.4% a year ago. Sales volume fell 3.9% to 48,669 units. For all of 2017, Toyota sold 684,186 units, 13% higher compared with 2016.

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