Hopes of a bottoming of the European have been frustrated, and the small April uptick turned out as a flash in the pan.

We warned in April not to read too much into car data, caused by a curious confluence of calendars. We predicted two weeks ago that the EU market will continue on its downward trajectory. And so it does. (Read More…)

With all the troubles in Europe, one would expect Volkswagen to hurt, but the Wolfsburg company is doing just fine, thank you. For the first five months, Volkswagen Group sales are up 5.9 percent to 3.87 million units. In May, global deliveries rose 6.9 percent to 816,500.

In China, Volkswagen could edge out perennial numbers leader GM. (Read More…)

The next generation European-market Volkswagen Passat will be delayed until at least the end of 2014, as Volkswagen follows an industry-trend in Europe of neglecting their slow-selling D-segment cars.

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The Chinese car market keeps plodding along. Total vehicle sales were 1,761,500 in May, up 9.81 percent. Passenger car sales were up 9.04 percent to 1,419,700 units. Commercial sales were up 12.88 percent to 364,600 units, the Chinese auto manufacturer association CAAM says.
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GM’s sales in GM’s and the world’s largest auto market China were  up 9.4 percent in May, the company says. In April, sales had been up 15.3 percent.

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After Germany’s sudden 3.8 percent sales rise in April, this site did not buy into the sentiment that the worst is over in Europe. It’s not. After the calendar-induced April fool’s gold, the German market continued its downward run, with the rest of Europe sure to follow. (Read More…)

Lincoln is cutting their free maintenance program in half, from 4 years/50,000 miles to 2 years/24,000 miles. (Read More…)

The Acura TSX’s future has been in doubt ever since the debut of the smaller ILX, but more than ever, the rebadged European Accord appears to be living on borrowed time.

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May sales were down in Japan, and this time around, small kei cars could not bail out their bigger brethren. Imports into the allegedly closed market Japan on the other hand are zooming, despite the weaker yen that makes imports more expensive. (Read More…)

Nissan, Ford and Chrysler led the way in April. GM and Toyota made smaller gains. Mitsubishi was this month’s loser, down 15 percent.

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Chrysler sets the tone for a most likely very happy sales day, reporting an 11 percent increase in its May U.S. light vehicle sales to Reuters. (Read More…)

The last week or two, I’ve been getting the Toronto Sun free of charge. The Sun, as it’s known, could be compared to, say, the New York Post, but it’s really more in the vein of a British tabloid paper. Like the Post, the front page always has some sensationalized headline, and it’s often looked down upon as the newspaper of the uneducated middle class, but if you want to know what’s really going on in Toronto, especially our farcical municipal politics, The Sun cannot be beat.

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Like the GM EV1, Volkswagen is planning a lease program from their XL1. While VW hasn’t announced pricing, the idea behind leasing is for VW to maintain a measure of control over the cars, specifically to ensure they’re located close to proper servicing centers and to avoid a secondary market for the cars. VW’s Mark Gillies confirmed to Autoblog that the lease program is the most likely avenue for customers to obtain an XL1.

Expect May auto sales to come in 6 percent to 8 percent higher than in May 2012, and the SAAR to rise above 15 million. This according to Reuters, and “after a disappointing result in the prior month” – for some. (Read More…)