German car sales fall 10% in May

MUNICH -- New-car sales in Germany fell nearly 10 percent in May dampening hopes for a recovery this year in the crisis-hit European market. The drop in the region's biggest market followed declines in France, Italy and Spain last month. Germany's passenger car registrations declined by 9.9 percent to 261,316 last month, the Federal Transport Authority said today. The decrease followed a gain of 3.8 percent in April. The biggest fall among volume brands was Opel's 16 percent drop. VW brand sales fell 10 percent and Fiat sales fell 11 percent while Ford limited its drop to 1 percent. VW's Seat brand, along with the Jaguar and Land Rover brands, Dacia, Mazda and Porsche increased registrations. Fleet sales fall fast Sales to fleet customers fell by nearly 14 percent in May, higher than the 4 percent decline in sales to private customers, the KBA said. The share of registrations by private customers bounced back to 41.3 percent, the highest level in more than 12 months. Germany's annualized selling rate was 2.8 million units in May compared with 3.15 million in April, Morgan Stanley said in a note to clients, Dacia was among the best performers with its German sales increasing by 19 percent, continuing the brand's positive momentum from the previous months following new product launches, Morgan Stanley said. A drop of 8 percent in Mercedes-Benz sales was "a somewhat disappointing performance" because the brand should be seeing some tailwinds from launches of the new A class and facelifted E-class, the note said. BMW sales fell 11 percent while Audi registrations were down 10 percent. Download PDF, above right, for German vehicle registrations by brand for May and first five months. The May fall in car sales in major markets shows that a 2 percent increase in Europe-wide car registrations in April was helped by extra sales days as Easter holidays fell earlier than in 2012. In France, car sales fell 10.3 percent last month. Sales in Italy were down 7.9 percent while Spain's registrations dropped 2.6 percent as a government subsidy to car buyers helped to limit the decline.