Jittery car dealers are predicting worse than expected new car registration figures for September, with some calling the market as much as 20% down on September last year.
September 2009 was 11.4% up on the same month in 2008 with 367,929 units being registered but let’s not forget that this figure was boosted by scrappage registrations and was up on a pretty dismal September 2008 which saw 330,295 units being registered, a drop of 21.2% on the year before.
According to an article published on AM online (Massive pre-reg activity likely in September) some industry insiders are quoted as saying the market could well be down 42,000 units on September last year which would come in at around the 11.5% mark and drop below the September 2008 figure.
If we take a look at following chart we see that new car registrations peaked in 2003 at 2,579,050 units and, with the exception of a slight blip in 2007, have been declining steadily ever since. The SMMT are predicting 2010 to come in at slightly ahead of 2 million units, downgraded from the original estimate of 2.15 million units. In fact 2009 saw 1,994,999 units being registered which was the lowest level since 1995.
If these dire predictions for September hold true there may be more than a few furrowed brows at the Paris Motor Show.
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