New passenger car registrations grew by almost 4% in July compared to the same month in 2019, but remain down 33% over the first seven months of the year.
In July, " with 178,981 registrations, the French market for new passenger cars is up 3.92% in raw data compared to July 2019 ", even though July 2020 had one working day less, specifies the Committee. French automobile manufacturers (CCFA) in a press release.
This result can be explained, among other things, by the good performance of the Renault group (+ 33%), whose brands Renault and Dacia jumped by 41% and 15% respectively. Conversely, the PSA group suffered a decline of 5%. While the lion brand Peugeot has won an increase of just over 6%, the Citroën, DS and Opel labels have fallen by 20%, 16% and 12% respectively.
A difficult month also for foreign manufacturers
As for foreign manufacturers, the German Volkswagen, by far the leading importer in France, saw its registrations drop by 13%, pulled down by its VW and Audi brands.
The month of July was also complicated for the German groups BMW (-3%) and Daimler (-25%). The FCA group (Fiat, Jeep, etc.) has seen its registrations decrease by around 15%. However, some have managed to do well, like the Japanese Nissan (+ 28%) and Toyota (+ 14%), the American Ford (+ 5%) or even the Korean Hyundai (+ 26%) .
Over the seven months from January to July, the automotive market still shows the stigma of containment and the economic crisis linked to the Covid-19 epidemic. New registrations reached a total of 894,779 vehicles, roughly 440,000 less than in the same period last year. This represents a plunge of 33%, felt in a generalized way by French and foreign groups.