In December last year, new car registrations totaled 1,143,653 units in the European Union (EU), increasing three percent year on year, according to the latest figures issued by the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association (ACEA).
In December, as regards the five major EU markets, Italy (+13.1%) and Spain (+9.3%) posted the highest gains year on year, followed by France (+5.8%) and Germany (+3.7%), which also performed better than in December 2015. Demand for new cars in the UK (-1.1%) dropped slightly.
Meanwhile, in 2016 new passenger car registrations in the EU increased to 14,641,356 units, up 6.8 percent year on year. In 2016, Italy saw an increase of 15.8 percent and Spain saw a rise of 10.9 percent, while new passenger car registrations in France rose by 5.1 percent, with registrations in Germany rising by 4.5 percent and with registrations in the UK up 2.3 percent, all on year-on-year basis.