It was a far more positive story in Australia where industry figures showed the number of cars shipped to dealers rose in both February 2009 and January of this year.
The rise for on February last year was expected: a year ago sales were falling when buyers pulled their horns in as the economy was hit by the GFC, the credit crunch and falling confidence.
Thanks to slowly recovering confidence and helped by tax breaks for small and medium business from the federal government, car sales recovered well last year.
Hyundai saw a rise in sales and it reached third place in the list of top sellers, a sign of solid demand from private buyers who rose from a year ago.
Sales to rental fleets rose sharply, as did sales to business.
Both had been mostly excluded from the tax breaks of last year which were aimed at small and medium business.
The 2.7% rise in growth in 2009 and 0.9% in the final quarter, confirmed that not only had demand recovered in Australia, but the economy was now more responsive to it than stimulus spending.
The car sales figures for February proved that by being higher than January, showing little evidence of a fall off caused by the pull forward of demand by those tax breaks which boosted sales in 2009.
Figures yesterday from the Federal Chamber of Automotive Industries (FCAI) show a 17.1% rise in February, compared with a year ago, as both business and private buyers returned to the market.
There were 82,219 passenger cars, sport utility vehicles (SUVs) and commercial vehicles sold in February, according to the Chamber’s figures.
Compared to January, there was a rise of nearly 10%, or more than 7,300 units in February, a good sign that demand had not been soaked up by the tax break induced jump in sales from June onwards.
"This is a very strong result and provides further evidence of renewed growth in vehicle sales," FCAI chief executive Andrew McKellar said in a statement.
"The number of private buyers rose 9.3% in February, compared with a year ago, while business sales increased 22.7% and the number of vehicles sold to rental companies was up 175% (similar to the US).
"It is encouraging to see private buyers edging back into the market following the financial concerns of the past year," Mr McKellar said.
"Looking ahead, sustaining the confidence of private buyers is the key challenge for the economy.
"For that reason we continue to be cautious about the impact of interest rate increases."
Troubled Toyota had the largest market share in February at 20.5%, followed by Holden at 13.6%. Hyundai, which came in third for the first time, had 8.8%.
