Europe's biggest car maker Volkswagen (VW) said today it had limited a drop in first-half sales to 5 per cent from the same period in 2008 but was cautious about the outlook for the rest of this year.
VW said in a statement that it delivered 3.1 million vehicles in the six months from January through June, in large part owing to its biggest market, China.
In June, the group managed to raise deliveries from the same month a year earlier, by 6.5 per cent to 609,800 vehicles.
VW, which wants to overtake Toyota as the world's biggest automaker by 2018, is "on the right path", company's Sales Director Detlef Wittig was quoted as saying in the company statement.
"We will have to work hard in the second half to stay on the path to success," he nonetheless added.
The group has forecast a 10 per cent decrease in sales this year, and is to publish detailed first-half figures next week.
A breakdown of the data showed that sales surged in Germany and remained strong in emerging markets like China and Brazil.
In Germany, deliveries climbed by 18 per cent to 631,000 vehicles thanks to a government-subsidised car scrapping bonus that has boosted small car sales.
