PwC: New vehicle sales to rise slightly this year in Romania, with production up 8.5%

Vehicle sales in Romania will end 2024 up by 1.7% as compared to last year, for cars and 0.6% for light commercial vehicles, shows a PwC Autofacts report conducted in five Central European markets.The markets analysed in this report are Romania, Poland, the Czech Republic, Hungary and Slovakia.   Despite a 10.2% drop in car sales in the first quarter of 2024 compared to the same period in 2023, this is the second consecutive quarter in which the 30,000 unit sales threshold has been exceeded, Autofacts shows. Dacia remains the best-selling brand. Tesla doubled its sales in the same period and climbed 11 places to enter the top 10.   The first quarter of this year was very, very good for the car production in Romania, which increased by 7%, registering the second quarter of growth in a row. For the whole year, the production is expected to grow by 8.5%, determined by LCV. In the case of cars, the production is estimated to drop by 7.1%.   At the level of the five states analysed, the cumulated sales would increase by 4.6% this year, all markets having a positive trend, Hungary having the highest leap, 8.7% against 2023.   In exchange, the production of light vehicles on these markets will drop by 0.8% in 2024 against 2023. The evolution will be the result of the reduction by 4% of the car sector, despite the estimated increase of the light commercial vehicles market (+35%). At the level of the country, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, the biggest production markets out of the five, will have production levels dropping by 1.6% and 3.5% respectively.   The production of electrical vehicles in the analysed countries in Central Europe continues to grow, estimated at more than 15.6% in 2024 against 2023, while until 2030 a huge advancement is expected of 208.4%. In 2024, the BEV (Battery Electric Vehicle)  performance is expected to be weaker (-2.3%) while PHEV (Plug-in-Hybrid -+24% and FHEV – Full Hybrid - +27.9% compensates for the loss. At the country level, BEV will continue to be the most popular type of electrified series-production powertrain for four of the five markets (except Romania) from 2027. In Romania, there will be produced especially FHEV (full hybrid).