BERLIN: New car sales in Germany declined 2 percent in June, held back by fewer working days than a year ago, the VDA auto industry association said on Wednesday.
Adjusted for work days, German car sales rose slightly in June, the association said and it reaffirmed its outlook for a slight improvement in German car sales this year.
Registrations of new cars in Europe's biggest auto market fell to 277,600 vehicles, the second drop in the past seven months, slowing the year-to-date gain to 2 percent or 1.54 million autos, VDA said.
June contained one less working day than the same month last year due to the Pentecost and Corpus Christi holidays, the latter of which is celebrated only in parts of the country, a VDA spokeswoman said.
"Germany's auto-market recovery remains intact," said Hanover-based NordLB analyst Frank Schwope. "The holiday factor weighed on June results."
Passenger-car production in the home market of Volkswagen , Daimler and BMW declined 4 percent to 454,800 vehicles in June while exports dropped by the same margin to 343,000, VDA said.
The surprise drop in Germany, though due to statistical effects, contrasts with a recovery elsewhere in Europe where three of the region's five top markets - France, Italy and Spain - on Tuesday reported higher sales.
The VDA reaffirmed its forecast for German car sales this year of about 3 million, compared with 2.95 million in 2013.
Comments
Comments are closed.