Diesel sales slump in Italy

Anti-diesel sentiment and Fiat’s continued struggles have wiped out one of diesel’s last major European strongholds in Italy.

While Germany, the UK and France saw their diesel sales flop down from about half to around a third of the new-car market last year, Italy’s diesel sales held up beyond 45 per cent.

Now it seems Europe’s post-Dieselgate anti-diesel sentiment has finally caught up with the peninsula, with its January new-car sales falling 7.6 per cent in January as the home of Fiat, Alfa Romeo, Lamborghini and Ferrari officially slipped into recession today.

The country shifted 164,864 cars in January, the Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport stated, and even though private demand lifted 4.3 per cent, the rest of the country’s car channels slumping.

The private sales were the only silver lining, rising 10 per cent in December and 5.2 per cent in November, according to Dataforce market research in Europe.

Even car dealer (13 per cent) and importer self-registrations (-92 per cent) fell drastically, long-term rentals collapsed 19 per cent and short-term rentals fell 16 per cent as the pain set in across the board. Direct sales to companies were down six per cent.

Unusually for Italy, petrol-powered cars climbed so high they claimed the majority of car sales (with 74,722 cars for 45.1 per cent of the market) for the first time in 16 years, rising 28 per cent.

Petrol sales in January 2018 were just 32.5 per cent, while diesel collapsed from 55.3 per cent of the entire Italian market in January last year to only 41.1 per cent this January.

Italy is a bit of an oddball in Europe, with no EV or PHEV credits or incentives (though they’ve been talked about) and a massively high share of petrol-powered cars – enough to force Europe’s car-makers to build them specifically for Italy.

Its LPG sales accounted for 7.3 per cent of the January market (up from 6.3), while CNG-powered cars gook 1.8 per cent.

Hybrids climbed in their share, up to five per cent from 3.9 per cent, while plug-in hybrids bumbled along at 0.2 per cent as customers waited for March 1, when incentives arrive for cars with fewer than 70g/km of CO2 emissions.

It might be FCA’s “other” home market, but its sales tumbling 22 per cent, dragged down by Alfa Romeo sales collapsing by 45 per cent in January, Fiat’s 29per cent stumble and Jeep’s shock 16 per cent decline. Jeep has long been the cash cow of FCA in Europe.

It could have been a critical collapse by FCA, with the group sliding back into the clutches of the second-biggest group in the country, PSA.

FCA dropped to an 18.8 per cent market share, while Peugeot, DS and Citroen group, PSA, climbed to 18.2 per cent.

Any change in the lead would mean the first time since WWII that Fiat hadn’t lead Italy’s new-car sales figures.

Only the now-comical Lancia survived the FCA cull, and they’d hope so given that the once-mighty race and rally champions now sell just one car, the Ypsilon hatch, in just one market – Italy.

Lancia jumped 55 per cent in January (on the back of a 54 per cent hike in private sales) to follow the Fiat Panda and become the second-most popular car in Italy.

Last year’s whipping boy, Opel, rose 10 per cent while the Volkswagen brand climbed 11 per cent. It wasn’t a great month for the VW Group, though, with Porsche falling 59 per cent, Audi dropping 37 per cent, Skoda falling 11 per cent and Seat dropping six per cent.

While the Panda and the Ypsilon lead the way, Volkswagen’s new compact crossover, the T-Roc, climbed to fourth and the leader among SUVs/crossovers.

Renault, in turmoil with its CEO jailed and replaced, dropped 14 per cent, even though Dacia climbed 14 per cent.