Germany’s passenger car market shrinks, orders from abroad rise

192,100 passenger cars were newly registered in Germany last month, nearly 9 percent less than in January 2012.

While new registrations of imported cars fell almost 16 percent, domestic sales of German-branded cars fell by 5 percent. “The January figures show that the German passenger car market cannot completely escape the economic difficulties in Europe,” said Matthias Wissmann, president of the German Association of the Automotive Industry (VDA), in a statement.

“Following the sharp 8 percent drop in orders from within Germany last year, we are now becoming more optimistic in view of their stability in January. The year 2013 will certainly be a year of demanding work,” Wissmann added. Exports from German plants were also smaller in January, with a total of 310,700 passenger cars from domestic production being delivered to foreign customers (-8 percent).

However, there are also good signs, as orders from abroad increased 4 percent in January. “The varying trends on the world markets are clearly shown by the fact that incoming orders from abroad increased once again in January – with a year-on-year rise of 4 per cent. Our foreign orders have therefore been growing continually for the last three and a half years,” Wissmann said.