APIA Results In H1: New Car Sales Drop 55%

Cosmina Capalău

Six months through a year of severe crisis for the automotive market, the aggregated results released by the Association of Automotive Manufacturers and Importers (APIA) confirm a bleak outlook for the months to come. Specifically, sales of new cars dropped 55.2% in the first half of the year compared to the corresponding period of 2008, reaching a total of 79,060 units.

APIA representatives reiterated the prediction they had made at the beginning of the year, estimating a return to the sales level reached in 2003, namely 140,000 units sold in the entire year. "Unfortunately, the figures available after the first half of the year make this scenario look more and more plausible. We have sold a bit over 70,000 cars, while the total market is approximately 79,000 units. The situation would probably have been worse had it not been for the State-driven car renewal programme, which helped us sell 11,500 cars equal to 16% of the market," APIA representatives added.

"An even bigger problem comes from the fact that, unlike most of the European Union countries, whose car sales increased from May to June, Romania reported further decrease, by 4.6%," APIA added. However, despite all the bad news, Romania"s only carmaker, Dacia Renault, achieved a significant increase in exports in the first half of the year (99.8% of the exports went to the EU15), partially due to the car renewal programmes organized by the governments of the respective countries.

• Romanian car production up 5.1%

According to the information compiled by APIA for the first half of the year, Romania"s car production gained 5.1% to 132,189 units in the first six months of the year. The automobile segment gained 6.4% to 140,125 units, while utility vehicles lost 12.1% to 7,936 units. Specifically, the production of light utility vehicles lost 10.6%, while the production of heavy utility vehicles (over 3.5 tonnes) lost 71%.

APIA representatives indicate that over 86% of Romania"s automotive production was exported, primarily due to the car renewal programmes organized by the governments of several European Union countries, especially Germany and France. Overall, exports increased by 56% to 120,739 units. Specifically, cars exports increased by 47.6% to 112,842 units (from 76,462 units in 2008-H1), while light utility vehicles surged nearly 10 times to 7,850 units (from 768 units in 2008-H1).

• Imports dropped 64% in June

Automotive imports reached 8,948 units in June, down by 64% year-on-year from 24,860 units. The overall value of the imports made in the first six months of the year decreased by 55.4% (55,896 units from 125,228 units in the first half of 2008). Within this global figure, cars lost 50.5% to 49,068 units, while utility vehicles lost 73.5% to 6,290 units.

Ranked by brand, car sales were driven by Dacia with 23,158 units, followed by Hyundai with 6,420 units, Volkswagen with 6,065 units, Renault with 5,759 units, Ford with 4,735 units and Skoda with 4,441 units.