MILAN: Carmakers reported tumbling sales across Asia and Europe yesterday as the recession drove buyers from showrooms and drew a warning of more gloom next year.
“I don’t see it (2009) being very good,” said Fiat chief executive Sergio Marchionne, who reported a 20 per cent fall in Italian sales of all manufacturers in November.
“It’s a market that we continue to see being very, very weak. The European market is shrinking in the major countries,” he told reporters at a Fiat plant in Italy.
Spanish car sales nearly halved, the biggest fall in nearly 16 years and the seventh straight month of decline, as credit restrictions and soaring unemployment took their toll.
Spain’s government last week budgeted euro800 million (euro1 = RM4.60) for its struggling car industry amid fears the sector could lose 50,000 jobs.
In France, headline sales at PSA fell more than 17 per cent in November with the Peugeot brand slumping nearly 20 per cent and Citroen off 14 per cent. Overall French new car registrations were down 14 per cent year-on-year and Belgian new cars sales fell 16.42 per cent.
Japan’s overall car sales in November slid 18.2 per cent from a year ago.Sales have fallen so much this year that car makers are cutting back on production, extending temporary plant closures and seeking help from governments to ride out the savage cutback in consumer spending.
The European Commission has pledged to help the car industry and included it in a e200 billion economic stimulus package.
“The financial crisis and the weaker economy is now hitting the auto market with full force,” said Bertil Molden, chief executive of Swedish auto industry body Bil Sweden.
US car makers have suffered the most in the downturn and been forced to take drastic measures with Ford saying it was considering a sale of Swedish unit Volvo.
Swedish new car sales fell 36 per cent in November to their lowest level since 1993. The government said it was talking to Saab and Volvo about loan guarantees but no specific sum had been discussed.
Along with Chrysler LLC, US automakers are also looking for help from their own government. In South Korea, combined sales of domestic automakers, including Hyundai Motor Co, fell 8.6 percent.South Korea’s Ministry of Knowledge Economy said that exports of South Korean auto-related products slumped 30.8 per cent in November.
The South Korean unit of General Motors Corp had began an extended production shutdown at one of its four domestic plants and plans to close down three other plants from December 22 until January 4.
Hyundai, meanwhile, said yesterday it was slashing overtime for the first time since 1998 at six of the company’s seven plants in South Korea . — Agencies
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