Turkey's passenger car sales rose 67.3% to 529,388 in the first 11 months of 2020 compared to the same period last year, according to data released by an industry group Wednesday.

The country's total car and light commercial vehicle market grew 72% to 668,495 units year-on-year this January to November, the Automotive Distributors' Association (ODD) said.

Some 139,107 light commercial vehicles were sold in this period, up 92.8% year-on-year.

On a monthly basis, the total passenger car and light commercial vehicle market saw a 37.8% rise in November, reaching 80,141 sales.

Passenger car sales jumped by over a third (34.6%) to 64,357 in the month.

The car market showed an increase of 7.4% in November compared to the 10-year average of November sales.

Within auto divisions, 87.5% of the market was composed of vehicles in the A, B and C segments with low tax rates. C-segment automobiles had a share of 63% with 333,551 units, while B-segment had 24% with 126,951 units.

When the automobile market is evaluated according to body types, the most preferred was sedans with 44.1% market share and 233,470 units. Next were SUVs, which made up 29.5% with the sales of 156,269 units, and H/B cars at 23.3% with 123,384 units.

Meanwhile, gasoline-powered automobile sales had a share of 51.7% with 273,570 units, diesel had 40.4% with 214,072 units and autogas had 4.2% with 22,344 units. A total of 568 electric and 18,834 hybrid cars were sold during the period.

Car sales slump in Europe

After a one-month reprieve, passenger car sales in Europe slumped again in October amid new restrictions in many countries aimed at containing a resurgence of the coronavirus, a European Automobile Manufacturers Association (ACEA) report from November showed.

The European industry registered 953,616 new car sales in October, a decrease of 7.8%, and a reversal of fortunes after September marked the first increase of the year, ACEA said. Demand dropped by 21% in Spain, 9.5% in France and 3.6% in Germany.

It was flat in Italy, where the effect of government incentives ran out in September, "confirming the insufficiency of funds allocated by the government to help the auto industry,'' Italy's carmaker association ANFIA said separately, according to an Associated Press (AP) report.

Only Ireland and Romania in the European Union posted gains, at 5.4% and 17.6%, respectively.

ACEA called the pandemic’s shrinkage of the car market "unprecedented,’’ with year-to-date sales down nearly 27%, at some 8 million passenger cars, or 2.9 million units fewer than 2019. That outstrips losses in the 2009 financial crisis, which took six years to recover from, even with government incentives.

Italian-American mass carmaker Fiat Chrysler bucked trends with a 4% increase in sales, due largely to Jeep, while its future partner, PSA Group, sank 6.6%. Together they claimed a 23% market share, behind Volkswagen's 25%, which it achieved despite registrations slumping by 9%. Volkswagen’s luxury brands Audi, Lamborghini, Bentley and Bugatti showed net gains in sales, while its mass brands all suffered. Sales by French rival Renault were flat.

The German luxury brands also suffered, with sales down 15.5% at BMW Group and 8.1% at Daimler.