'Crisis-Hit' Bulgarians Buy New Cars Like Crazy
Business | May 17, 2011, Tuesday // 13:02| viewsPoor Bulgarians rank fourth among EU nations in terms of growth in the purchases of new cars for April, according to official data.
A study from the European Automobile Manufacturers' Association (ACEA) has shown that for April deals with new cars in Bulgaria have risen to 35.8%, which makes 1637 new cars sold, with sales grown by 26.2% for the first 4 months of 2011.
Bulgaria ranks fourth behind Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia, where new car purchases have close to doubled.
Overall, in Europe sales of new cars have dropped by 4.1% for April and with 2.7% for the first 4 months of 2011.
Commenters have explained that the Bulgarian boom is relative and is largely due to the extremely low level of new car deals for 2010.
As another factor is seen in the emergence of low offers and profitable crediting conditions.
Some analysts think that due to the comparatively low prices of new cars in Bulgaria, some of the cars sold are actually then driven out of the country to be used in other EU states.
Companies have claimed that out of 18,820 cars sold in 2010, some 3,000 have never been registered with authorities in Bulgaria, which means they have been exported.
In Europe Germany is the only large market with a growth in demand for April, about 2.6%.
Spain has marked a drastic slowdown of sales for April, with 23.3% negative growth, while sales in France have dropped by 11.1%.
For the first 4 months of 2011 however, for some two-thirds of EU member states there is still growth in new car sales.
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