Against a generally flat market Fiat Group Automobiles turned in another impressive sales performance across Europe during June, outperforming all its main rivals as it went up 9.9 pct year-on-year, and with all three divisional brands making major gains. The data, which covers all the EU member nations (including new members) plus the EFTA signatories, was released earlier this morning by European car manufacturer trade body ACEA.

While the overall European market was up just 0.7 pct, which equated to 1,543,770 vehicles in June compared to 1,532,790 during the same month last year, Fiat was helped by its runaway Italian sales successes as the Turinese carmaker's domestic market recorded big gains last month, up 8.0 pct year-on-year, with 226,057 registrations being made. This put Italy into second place, behind only Germany (301,108 units; -7.0 pct), and ahead of the UK (222,863 units; +1.5 pct) and France (216,476 units; -3.2 pct).

It also meant Fiat Group Automobiles (+9.9 pct) beat the performances of all its big carmaking rivals in Europe: VW/Audi (+1.2 pct), PSA Peugeot-Citroen (+3.6 pct), Ford (-4.8 pct), GM Vauxhall/Opel (+3.5 pct), Renault (-9.1 pct), Toyota (-7.3 pct), DaimlerChrysler (-1.8 pct) and BMW (+6.9 pct) either fell year-on-year during last or couldn't match Fiat's impressive spurt.

As a whole Fiat was up 9.9 pct year-on-year in June, with 119,130 registrations compared to 108,354 during the same period last year. This raised its overall European market share from 7.1 to 7.7 pct. The Fiat brand (including Fiat Professional), boosted by growing demand for the new C-segment Bravo model was the best performer, up 11.4 pct year-on-year, which equated to 92,211 units during this June compared to 82,739 a year ago. Alfa Romeo also did well, it was up 5.4 pct with 14,766 car sales last month as opposed to 14,007 in June last year.
 

Meanwhile Lancia put on 5.8 pct year-on-year as it saw 11,701 unit sales last month, up from the 11,058 it achieved in June 2006. These results see the Fiat brand raising its European market share from 0.5 to 6.0 pct year-on-year, while Alfa Romeo is up from 0.9 to 1.0 pct and Lancia up 0.7 to 0.8 pct.

After the first half of 2007, Fiat Group Automobiles has sold 695,766 new vehicles compared to 648,762 during the first six months of last year, putting it up 7.2 pct year-on-year and raising its European market share from 7.6 to 8.2 pct for year-to-date (YTD). This effort sees it out perform the overall European new vehicle market (down 0.2 pct) and all its main rivals, during the first six months of this year. Of the bigger groups VW is down 0.1 pct, PSA (+0.8 pct), Ford (+0.9 pct), GM (-1.3 pct) and Renault (-9.5 pct). Below Fiat's six place come Toyota (+5.4 pct), DaimlerChrysler (-4.4 pct) and BMW (+0.6 pct). Only Honda of all the carmakers records a better year on year rise over Fiat during the first half of the year (+17.3 pct) although this is only on a total volume of just 169,546 units.

For the first six months the Fiat brand (including Fiat Professional) is up 8.2 pct year-on-year, with 538,804 unit registrations, 'sporty' division Alfa Romeo has 82,065 car sales YTD and is up 1.4 pct, while Lancia has 71,872 units sales YTD which puts the 'luxury' division on 6.9 pct. This means the Fiat brand's share of the European market climbs from 5.8 to 6.3 pct YTD, Alfa Romeo is up from 0.9 to 1.0 pct, and Lancia remains steady on 0.8 pct.