New vehicle sales have gone up more than 21% in the first ten months of the year, compared with the same time in 2001, reaching 90,695 units. The figures are much below the estimates released early this year, when sales had been forecast to exceed 120,000 units, which would have accounted for an over 35% increase.
Imports continued to increase compared with last year, still the growth pace was not as fast as in the previous years.
Whereas imports were increasing by more than 70-80% in 1999 or 2000, they gained "only" 43% to more than 35,000 vehicles in the first ten months of 2002.
Still, this is much higher than the 30% everybody forecast early in the year.
The top imported brand is again Renault, which has come to a total of 7,612 units sold in the first ten months, due to the 1,033 units sold
in October. The ten-month figures are very close to its full-year estimates (8,000 units). Renault sales were 16% higher compared with the same time last year. Second top imported brand is Volkswagen, which totals 4,657 units sold throughout January-October 2002, due to the 510 cars sold in October. The company sold 12% more than in the corresponding period last year.
Skoda comes next among the most popular imported brands with 3,804 units sold since the beginning of the year, followed by Peugeot - 3,377 units. Mercedes ranks 5th although having sold far less than the top four makers, that is 1,810 units in the first ten months, followed by Fiat and Ford with nearly 1,800 autos each. Opel sold nearly 1,500 units in the first ten months, with Iveco and Citroen also among the top ten imported brands.
Iveco is after all the leader of the >3.5 t vehicle market. The other brands on this segment are Mercedes - 460 units, DAF - 184 units, MAN - 85 units and the local producer Roman Brasov that sold 339 units in the first ten months of the year.
Out of the local vehicle makers, Dacia remains the best-selling brand in Romania (more than 43,000 units). Cars account for nearly 80% of the total Dacia sales.
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