According to Bloomberg, the latest data released by the French Automobile Association Plateforme Automobile (PFA) shows that due to the decrease in Stellantis’s car sales, the number of new car registrations in France in February fell by 0.7% year-on-year.
According to PFA data, last month, the number of new car registrations in the French market was 141,568, down from 142,595 in the same period last year; in the first two months of this year, the number of new car registrations in the country was 256,241, a year-on-year decrease of 3.3%. From the perspective of enterprises, in February, the registration volume of Stellantis, the largest automaker in France, fell 11% year-on-year; sales of Renault Group increased by 18% year-on-year; and the registration volume of Tesla fell 26%, far higher than the overall decline in France’s registration volume.
According to PFA data, Tesla’s performance in France continued to be weak in February, with new car registrations falling to 2,395 units year-on-year. Prior to this, Tesla’s registration volume in France plummeted 63% to 1,141 units in January, the lowest level in France since August 2022, and also declined in major markets such as the UK and Germany. Overall, Tesla’s registration volume in the European market fell by 45% in January, in sharp contrast to the overall registration volume of electric vehicles in the European market’s growth of 37%.
Bloomberg reports pointed out that Tesla’s slow start in France this year was partly due to the launch of a new version of its most popular model, the Tesla Model Y, which would require a few weeks of production to be discontinued to update the production line, which would temporarily affect the company’s overall sales.
Investors are also worried that Tesla CEO Elon Musk, one of the senior advisers to U.S. President Donald Trump, may bear the brunt of retaliation against Musk. Several of Tesla’s showrooms have been damaged in recent weeks as consumers protested against the CEO at dozens of Tesla’s stores.
A survey conducted by electric vehicle review website Electrifying.com at the end of January showed that 59% of UK electric vehicle owners and consumers who intend to buy electric vehicles said they would not buy Tesla cars given Musk’s influence.