Renault, GM Lead Europe Sales Drop as Oil Prices Rise

Renault SA and General Motors Corp. led a decline in European car sales in June, the second monthly drop this year, as rising gasoline prices discouraged large purchases and some countries had fewer working days.

Industrywide sales fell 4.1 percent to 1.5 million vehicles from 1.55 million units a year earlier, the Brussels-based European Automobile Manufacturers Association said in a statement today. First-half sales gained 1.3 percent to 8.32 million units.

“Those numbers are atrocious,” Stephen Pope, head of equity research at Cantor Fitzgerald in London, said. “The recent uptick in oil prices has to make producers go through an entire rethinking of engine efficiency.”
Bloomberg