Global Demand for Passenger Vehicles in October up 5 Percent
Based on data (preliminary in some cases), global demand for passenger vehicles in October is up by more than five percent from the year before according to the latest data from IHS Automotive (Polk).
Global sales of passenger vehicles in the first ten months of the year were up about 2.83 million units (5.5%) from the year before.
Global New Registrations Expected to Exceed 75 Million Units Global new registrations will once again set a new record in 2013, growing by more than 4% over 2012.
New registrations in the Asia/Pacific region will increase by more than 6% in 2013 compared to the previous year. In addition to the aforementioned statistical effect, the forecast for Thailand has been raised by a significant amount (up 144,000 units).
The Asia/Pacific region increased about 6% from the year before in October, according to preliminary estimates. For the year, this region (the largest in the world) is up more than 7% from the year before. While China remains the region’s growth driver, Japan has also posted double-digit gains from the same period of last year.
Eastern Europe (down 1.2%) continues to suffer from a relatively weak Russian market. Despite cheaper credit, new registrations are down around 7% from the previous year. Despite the strength of other markets in Eastern Europe, the region as a whole is down 1.4% from the previous year.
The NAFTA region (up 9.6%) is continuing to trend upward as the U.S., in particular, reported strong growth once again despite the budget crisis. New registrations in the NAFTA region are expected to continue to rebound to about 18.3 million units. The forecast for this region was not revised significantly. The same is true for Latin America, where new registrations are expected to grow by almost 2%, to 6.1 million units.
In Western Europe (up 4.2%), Italy was the only key market where sales were down. The strongest growth has been in Spain (in relative terms) and in the UK (in absolute terms). Despite these gains, overall the Western Europe is still down by more than 3% from the previous year. Western European passenger vehicle demand will decline for the fourth year in a row in 2013 (down 2.8%), falling to approximately where it was in 1993. However, the trend in new registrations seems to have bottomed out. In addition to heavyweights like Germany, France (down 140,000 units each) and Italy (down 102,000 units), the Netherlands will also contribute significantly to the decline in sales (down 116,000 units).
Eastern Europe will decline slightly in 2013, due to the fact that the situation in Russia has now worsened. The worsening economic outlook in conjunction with low oil prices has caused new registrations to slump lately. The relative strength of the smaller markets in this region will not be enough to offset these losses.
Category: General Update, Vehicles
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