During April passenger car demand across the EU showed a strong return to growth, up 9.6%, and bouncing back after demand declined in March. A total of 1,306,273 new cars were registered last month.

All five major EU markets saw substantial increases: Spain (+12.3%) and the United Kingdom (+10.4%) recorded the strongest growth, followed by France (+9.0%), Germany (+8.0%) and Italy (+6.5%). 

After a negative year so far even a 2% rise for FCA in a climbing EU market last month was a positive direction to takehold of and that added up to a sales improvement of just over one and a half thousand units year-on-year.

However, with all its mass market rivals performing much better FCA’s share of European car sales for the month fell by 0.6% to 6.8% year-on-year.

The other big volume carmakers enjoyed the upwards trend in April, VW Group was up 13.8%, Renault was up 9.7% and Ford was up 14% while PSA Peugeot-Citroën was also up in the double digits when the sales distortion of its recently acquired Vauxhall and Opel brands are removed from its data. Smaller than FCA in sales volumes terms, German premium carmakers BMW and Mercedes were both flat for the month of April.

FCA’s main volume driver, the Fiat brand, endured a torrid April and it fell by 4.7% and more than three thousand units year-on-year to 62,976 units. As a result, its market share slipped by 0.7% year-on-year to 4.8%.

Alfa Romeo gained useful ground in May, up 6.6% and five hundred units to 7,510 units although Lancia went the other way as its sales continue in terminal decline, it was down 25.9% to 4,392 units.

Ferrari and Maserati suffered a weak month just gone, their combined sales slipped by 6.9% to 624 units. Finally, for FCA, Jeep brand had a very strong month, up 74.8% to 13,959 units.

From January to April demand for new cars in the European Union increased by 2.7%, driven by last month’s robust growth. Car registrations went up in Spain (+11.0%), Germany (+5.0%) and France (+4.4%) although demand for new cars contracted in the UK (-8.8%). The new EU member states performed very well so far in 2018, with registrations increasing by 12.5%.

Overall, 5,478,442 new passenger cars were registered in the EU during the first four months of the year while for the same period FCA is struggling, down 2.8% and a little over ten thousand units to 375,432 units, which means its market share has slipped by 0.3% year-on-year to 6.9%.

Its big carmaking rivals are mostly up, VW, PSA Peugeot-Citroën and Renault all have recorded strong year-on-year gains while groups that have missed the direction of the market as well as FCA include Ford, down 1.3%, BMW, which has lost 1.4%, and Mercedes, which sees its sales flat.

The Fiat brand has lost a lot of sales volume this year, it’s down 8.4% and twenty-five thousand units to 268,645 units for the year-to-date, pushed downwards by weak demand on its home market and in particular its best-selling A-segment Panda model.

Alfa Romeo continues to make good ground but is still underperforming its current product portfolio so usefully there are major gains to be unlocked over the rest of the year. The ‘sports’ brand is up 13% to 31,421 units which gives it an 0.6% share of the total EU market for the first four months of the year.

Lancia’s long decline continues unabated as the single model brand sees demand steadily fading and sales of its B-segment Ypsilon city car are down 34% so far this year with 18,114 units having been sold after four months.

The luxury brands, Ferrari and Maserati have a combined 2,826 sales for the year-to-date which represents a sharp fall of 19.1% when compared to the same period last year and finally for FCA, the off road focused Jeep brand is up 58.3% to 54,426 units.