However, it is worth considering that March of last year turned out to be a record month for the market, so the comparison base was quite high.
In some EU markets, and especially in the UK, growth rates slowed down: sales there fell by 15.7% in March. A decline in demand for new cars was also recorded in Italy (-5.8%) and Germany (-3.4%), while in France and Spain, on the contrary, there was an increase in buyer activity — by 2.2% and 2.1%, respectively.
The largest automotive market in Europe at the end of the reporting month was again the UK, where 474,069 new passenger cars were sold.
Germany took second place — residents of the country purchased 347,433 cars in March.
France closes the top three with 231,103 cars sold.
Among European manufacturers, VW Group traditionally holds the first line: the concern sold 405,103 cars in EU markets, which is 0.3% more than in March a year earlier.
PSA Group is in second place with 285,434 cars sold — this is 59.7% higher than the March 2017 level.
The third sales volume is at Renault Group — 174,884 cars, which is 3.2% less.
According to the results of the first three months of 2018, demand for new cars in the European Union remained positive compared to the same period last year.
In total, in the first quarter of 2018, 4,171,268 new passenger cars were registered in EU countries — this is 0.7% more than in the same period last year. Registration growth was recorded in Spain (+10.5%), Germany (+4.0%) and France (+2.9%), while in Italy and the United Kingdom sales fell by 1.5% and 12.4%, respectively.
The new EU member states also showed good results: the total registration of new cars in them over the specified period increased by almost 12 percent.
