Romanian Auto Mkt Dn 63% In New Car Registrations In Feb, Sharpest Decline In EU

The decline in February, however, is milder than the 84.6% drop in new car registrations Romania saw in January, according to the European Carmakers Association ACEA.

New car registration in Romania in February dropped to 2,658 units from 7,187 in February last year.

New registrations of Romanian-made Dacia cars saw the biggest increase in registrations in February in the EU and Iceland, Norway and Switzerland, of 45.4%, to 17,491 units. In January, Dacia registrations increased 69.7%.

The Romanian carmaker’s market share also increased to 1.8% in February, from 1.6% in January and 1.3% in February 2009.

Dacia’s owner, French carmaker Renault saw its new car registrations up nearly 30% in February, to 108,150 units. It’s market share also increased to 11.1% from 8.8% in February last year.

A total of 974,346 new cars were registered in Europe (except Malta and Cyprus, for which data is unavailable) in February, 3% more than in February 2009. Auto markets increased in 15 EU states and declined in the rest. The biggest growth, of 53%, was registered in Portugal.

A decrease in Europe’s second largest market Germany (minus 29.8%), was countered by an increase in the other major markets. Under the continued influence of government fleet renewal incentives, France recorded 18.2% more registrations in February, Italy recordeed 20.6% more registrations, the UK saw 26.4% more registration and the Spanish auto market incaresed 47.0%.

Romania, Hungary and Poland saw registrations decrease by 63.0%, 57.9% and 19.2%.

The carmaker with the most new car registrations in February was Volkswagen, with 200,897 cars.