Romania's automotive market up approx.20pct in 2018; automotive deliveries stand at 187,276 units

The number of new vehicles sold in Romania in 2018 increased by approximately 20 percent against 2017, up to 187,276 units, of which 158,268 units representing cars, the data published by the Association of Romanian Automobiles Makers and Importers (APIA) on Wednesday.

The specialist analysis shows that in 2018 Romania's automotive market registered the highest annual volume of car sales over the past 10 years, but well below the one recorded before the 2009 economic crisis.

At national level, the purchases of motor vehicles are mainly made by legal entities, covering 60 percent of total purchases of cars registered in 2018.

"However, it's worth noticing that the number of cars purchased by individuals in 2018 (63,378 units) is by approximately 44.4 percent higher than the one recorded in 2017 (43,884 units)," the APIA shows.

According to the APIA, in respect to the second-hand cars, their volume declined last year by 9.1 percent against 2017, standing at 473,616 units.

The centralised data shows that in 2018, a number of 187,276 units were delivered, increasing by 19.6 percent compared to 2017 and of these 158,268 were cars, namely the equivalent of a 21.4 percent jump against the previous year and 29,008 commercial vehicles (+11.1 percent).

By brands (passenger cars plus commercial vehicles) Dacia was the leader, with 54,593 units sold, followed by Volkswagen (16,459 units), Ford (13,957 units) and Skoda (13,185 units).

Moreover, depending on the country of origin of the cars, the situation is as following: from Romania 31.7 percent, from Germany 18.6 percent, from the Czech Republic 10.3 percent, from Turkey 8.7 percent and from Spain 7.6 percent. In this context, the official data shows that the vehicles from the domestic production recorded a 37.1 percent increase compared to the previous year, whereas vehicles from import accounted for a 15.2 percent increase.