European car sales rise 3% in Feb

Car sales rose 3 percent across the European Union in February, carmakers' association ACEA said, a smaller increase than in previous months as the effects of government subsidies started to peter out. Government incentives introduced to help struggling carmakers when the crisis hit supported car sales last year, but the schemes are waning and European car sales are expected to fall in 2010.

Renault's CEO has predicted a 10 percent dip in the European market while PSA Peugeot Citroen is counting on a 9 percent slide.

Nick Reilly, CEO of General Motors' European unit Opel has said he thinks the European car market will shrink by between 1 and 1.5 million units in 2010.

Car sales rose 3 percent across the European Union in February, ACEA said in a statement, with 974,346 cars registered. In January, sales were up 12.9 percent year-on-year.

Germany - whose scheme ran out at the beginning of September - saw a 29.8 percent drop in sales, while France, where the scrapping scheme is still in place, saw an 18.2 percent increase.

ACEA said February car sales across the European Union were 15 percent lower, however, than February 2008, before the crisis hit.

Car registrations were up 7.9 percent across the European Union in the first two months of the year, compared with the first two months of last year.