Spanish car sales up nearly 40 percent in April

April vehicle sales in Spain have surged as scrapping incentives continued to sustain the increase in demand for new cars. At the same time in France sales progress slowed down, displaying the initial indications of the negative effect of tapering bonuses.

Car sales have been buoyed by scrapping incentive programmes in major marketplaces but some of these have run out or are due to end soon. This is leading to forecasts of a demanding 2nd half of this year from a lot of car manufacturers.

In Spain, where scrapping incentives are in place until the end of June, with calls for them to be extended, new car sales showed a 39.3 percent increase to 93,637 units in April.

In France, where scrapping incentives were lowered at the beginning of this year, but are carrying on at a reduced rate, registrations increased 1.9 percent in April to 190,986 units.

“Here we see the impact of the gradual reduction in the scrapping incentive,” explained a spokesperson for the industry organization CCFA.

“There is something of a decrease in the small-car category, which benefitted most from the program, and we know that we’ll move into negative territory by the end of the year,” the spokesperson stated.

“Despite this, the reports we have from carmakers also show that levels of orders for new models and medium-sized models are good, which means that the market is still holding up despite the reduction in aid,” they went on.

France’s largest car manufacturer, PSA/Peugeot-Citroen, have seen sales of its Peugeot brand cars increase 24.2 percent in April in comparison with the same month in 2009, while Citroen cars reduced by8.6 percent, making an all round 7.3 percent increase for the group.

Competitor Renault have seen group sales improve 17.2 percent, with Renault cars increase 9 percent and sales of the budget Dacia models more than doubling. Renault has predicted a 10 percent decrease in the European car market as a whole for this year.