EU car sales in May fell drastically, showing a 20 year low. This is due to rising jobless issues caused by the continued recession in the euro region that is hitting PSA Peugeot Citroen, Renalut SA and General Motors Co.
Registrations across the 27 member EU dropped 5.9 % to 1.04 million vehicles in May. This was compared to the 1.11 million cars a year ago at this time. The European Automobile Manufacturers’ Association indicated that this is the lowest level for the month of May since 1993. In April, the unemployment rate peaked at 12.2% in the 17 countries that use the euro. As Jens Schattner, a Frankfurt-based analyst at Macquarie Group Ltd. said, “Nobody’s buying cars,” and there’s “no reason to be optimistic.”
The car sale drop in May actually came on the heels of an increase in April, the first of its kind in 19 months. As Thomas Besson, a Paris-based analyst at Kepler Capital Markets said, “The main difficulty is that the U.K. market is the only one that supports European demand because the German one is worse than expected. That being said, consumer confidence is improving everywhere in Europe except in France and Italy, and this is very encouraging.”
