European Car market in 2020 falls by 23.8% as the pandemic and lockdowns affect sales. Full-Year sales have been 12.2 Million, while Spain reported the sharpest drop in the leaderboard by falling 30.6%, while Sweden registered the top hold, losing “only” 18.5%.
Market Trend
The European car market was hit in 2020 by the global pandemic, which has impacted sales tremendously.
In recent years the market was recovering after the fall caused by the 2008-2009 financial crisis. In the last 6 years, the sales increased considerably and their sales were near to the pre-crisis level.
After starting the year with a slight negative trend (-7.8%), the market quickly collapsed in March (-50.8%) as the virus struck. The sharpest drop in sales this year was in April when sales declined by 77.1% as many countries in the EU started to enter lockdowns and impose restrictions.
Thanks to EU incentives the market started recovering fairly quickly, reaching -4.3% in July (-4.3%). The only positive month for the entire year was September when the market remained flat (+0.6%). In the second half of the year, only 2 months reported double-digit drops: August (-17.5% and November (-12.9%).
Indeed, Full-Year sales for 2020 have been 12.206.559, reporting a decline of 23.8% compared to 2019.
This year the best-performing country on the leaderboard has been Sweden, which lost 18.5%, with Germany -the biggest market in Europe- as a close second, losing 18.9%. France lost 25.5% and Italy 28.2%. Meanwhile, Spain reported the sharpest drop in sales with a loss of 30.6%, closely followed by the UK, which lost 29.2%.
Tables with sales figures
In the tables below we report sales fro the top 20 countries.
