The European car market remained stable in May 2019 for the second month in a row. In total, 1.44 million vehicles were registered – a 0.2% increase on May 2018. The stable results from April and May signify an end to the market’s extended period of decline between September 2018 and March 2019. However, year-to-date figures show 6.91 million vehicles have been registered so far in 2019 – a decline of 2% on the same period last year.
Despite the market’s slowdown this year, last month was the highest volume registered in the month of May since 2007, when registrations also totalled 1.44 million units. Explaining the results, Felipe Munoz, JATO’s global analyst, said: “The market had a welcoming response to the latest vehicle launches in May. Moving forward, there’s still a long way to go until we see real progress with EVs, which means SUVs will continue to be the best hope for carmakers selling cars in Europe.”
SUVs once again drove market growth in May, offsetting the drops posted by the traditional segments. While demand for subcompact, compact, midsize and executive/luxury cars and MPVs fell during the month, demand for SUVs was up by 10% to 534,700 units. SUVs continued to dominate the European market, as they counted for 37.2% of total registrations and posted a market share increase of 3.2 percentage points on the same time last year. Year-to-date figures show 2.56 million SUVs have been registered so far in 2019 in Europe – an increase of 8%.
SUVs’ growth came from the strong results posted by small and compact SUVs, which when combined counted for 81% of the segment’s total registrations. This was largely due to the good reception for the latest small SUV arrivals to the market, such as the Volkswagen T-Roc and T-Cross, Hyundai Kona and the new Dacia Duster, which led to a volume increase of 13% to 209,600 registrations. This is a remarkable increase over the last 10 years, considering there were only 125,000 small SUV registrations across the whole of 2009. Meanwhile, demand for compact SUVs grew by 10% to 225,900 units, led by the Volkswagen Tiguan, Peugeot 3008 and Nissan Qashqai.
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SOURCE: Jato
