Picking up where I finished in the last edition, the Euro 5 / Euro 5 + end of year ' pre-reg ' rush to get motorcycles registered for sale legally after the new regulation version came into force on 1st January continues to cast a long shadow. We knew it would, and it will likely still be doing, in statistical terms at least until the year-end. Possibly into 2026 as we lap the distorted H1 2025 figures. The most recent available National Trade Association data for Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK( data from the IVM, ANCMA, ANESDOR and the MCIA respectively) appear on pages six and seven of this issue. The bad news is that they are clearly still distorted by the 2024 Q4 ' pre reg ' issue. The good news though is that they do make slightly better reading when compared to the ' near death experience ' of preparing the data for the prior edition. In Germany( especially)-25.9 %( January- July) is a little easier to take than the-30.90 % reported for the first five month, even though only a 5 % improvement. When the carry-over model sales are added to the 112,096 Euro 5 + units registered for the seven month YTD( around 25-35,000 units- of which at least 15- 20,000 will have been sold in the period to the end of July) it is more likely that the German market is closer to-15 % down YTD with some 10- 15,000 units of ' data subsidy ' still set to work their way through. In order to prepare the data this year we are comparing the usual National Trade Association sources data seen in their top-line registration statistics to other data sets. Especially to the brand market share data released that is routinely released by most of the Trade Associations and the ' Big Five ' data released quarterly by ACEM. The trends seen in those metrics confirm our thinking. Namely that we are seeing a market in Europe that is doing at least somewhat better than it would appear. So as the months tick by we are increasingly comfortable with the year-end forecasts we are making of, for example, a-3 % to-5 % year-end number for the German market in 2025. This ' hunch '(' guesstimated '?) edges closer to meaningful forecast territory when the market performance in Spain is added to the wider pan-European context. There, the ' pre-reg ' issue was either a lot less pronounced at the end of 2024 or else the 2025 market is on fire. Knowing the efficiency of ANESDOR ' s data gathering and reporting under long-serving Secretary General José María Riano it is much more likely to be the former- though that said, the motorcycle market in Spain is continuing to do well. Motorcycle sales in Spain were up by + 9.95 % by the end of July 2025( 141,249 units), from + 6.58 % for H1( 112,880 units). The jewel in Europe ' s crown in recent years has been the Italian market, but even there the data so far this year has been scary. From-15.03 %( 81,933 units) for the first half of the year, to-13.56 %( 97,983 units) for the first seven months might not seem a trend to stake-the-farm on( and it isn ' t) but for a 26-day selling period we ' ll take it. If repeated for each of the next five months( August to December) a + 3 % to + 5 % result would be a triumph when the added Euro 5 carry-over sales are factored into the Euro 5 + equation. recovery from Q4 2024‘ prereg’ trauma
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" But, soft! What light through yonder window breaks?"
Picking up where I finished in the last edition, the Euro 5 / Euro 5 + end of year ' pre-reg ' rush to get motorcycles registered for sale legally after the new regulation version came into force on 1st January continues to cast a long shadow. We knew it would, and it will likely still be doing, in statistical terms at least until the year-end. Possibly into 2026 as we lap the distorted H1 2025 figures. The most recent available National Trade Association data for Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK( data from the IVM, ANCMA, ANESDOR and the MCIA respectively) appear on pages six and seven of this issue. The bad news is that they are clearly still distorted by the 2024 Q4 ' pre reg ' issue. The good news though is that they do make slightly better reading when compared to the ' near death experience ' of preparing the data for the prior edition. In Germany( especially)-25.9 %( January- July) is a little easier to take than the-30.90 % reported for the first five month, even though only a 5 % improvement. When the carry-over model sales are added to the 112,096 Euro 5 + units registered for the seven month YTD( around 25-35,000 units- of which at least 15- 20,000 will have been sold in the period to the end of July) it is more likely that the German market is closer to-15 % down YTD with some 10- 15,000 units of ' data subsidy ' still set to work their way through. In order to prepare the data this year we are comparing the usual National Trade Association sources data seen in their top-line registration statistics to other data sets. Especially to the brand market share data released that is routinely released by most of the Trade Associations and the ' Big Five ' data released quarterly by ACEM. The trends seen in those metrics confirm our thinking. Namely that we are seeing a market in Europe that is doing at least somewhat better than it would appear. So as the months tick by we are increasingly comfortable with the year-end forecasts we are making of, for example, a-3 % to-5 % year-end number for the German market in 2025. This ' hunch '(' guesstimated '?) edges closer to meaningful forecast territory when the market performance in Spain is added to the wider pan-European context. There, the ' pre-reg ' issue was either a lot less pronounced at the end of 2024 or else the 2025 market is on fire. Knowing the efficiency of ANESDOR ' s data gathering and reporting under long-serving Secretary General José María Riano it is much more likely to be the former- though that said, the motorcycle market in Spain is continuing to do well. Motorcycle sales in Spain were up by + 9.95 % by the end of July 2025( 141,249 units), from + 6.58 % for H1( 112,880 units). The jewel in Europe ' s crown in recent years has been the Italian market, but even there the data so far this year has been scary. From-15.03 %( 81,933 units) for the first half of the year, to-13.56 %( 97,983 units) for the first seven months might not seem a trend to stake-the-farm on( and it isn ' t) but for a 26-day selling period we ' ll take it. If repeated for each of the next five months( August to December) a + 3 % to + 5 % result would be a triumph when the added Euro 5 carry-over sales are factored into the Euro 5 + equation. recovery from Q4 2024‘ prereg’ trauma
In terms of theoretically ' major markets ' in Europe, if there is a ' sick man of Europe ' then I am afraid to report it is my own country. As there has been for most of the past 12-18 months, there are again several reports in this edition( mostly in the News Briefs) about manufacturers( motorcycles and P & A / G & A) and distributors struggling or going out of business. Dealership and P & A / G7A retail outlet closures have been running at a highest rate since time of the 2007-2009 Financial Crisis too. UK new motorcycle registrations were reported by the MCIA, the UK ' s motorcycle industry trade association, as being-20.21 % for the five months to the end of May 2025 at a ' mere ' 37,267 units- way too few to keep the doors of what is clearly now an over-populated dealer network alive. At-17.57 % two month later( January to July 2017) the recovery is meagre for something like 50 selling days, and 55,769 new registrations are not going to be keeping all the lights on. Yes, there was a ' pre-reg ' issue in the UK too, as everywhere, but even allowing for around half of those finally finding buyers this year the ' real world ' UK sales figure January-July YTD is still only likely to be around 60,000 units at best. With the best will in the world the most optimistic forecast we can justify for the UK 2025 fullyear at this time is in the region of-2 % to-4 %. Europe ' s so-called ' Big Five ' national markets account for something in the region of 80 % of all the annual motorcycle sales in Europe, however the economies are doing. Of the rest of Europe, the markets in Poland and Greece are not to be underestimated, but of the ' Big Five ' the most difficult for anyone to report on is France. As far as anyone outside France can tell, CSIAM, the motorcycle trade association that includes representation of the motorcycle industry France does a good job in a very tricky context, but they do not release registration data with the kind of frequency that we and other outlets would find useful. So, in the case of France, the primary source we check-in on is the quarterly ' Big Five ' releases by ACEM. Though they are generally an additional month behind compared to the National Trade Associations, they are instructive For the French Market the ' pre-reg ' issue was clearly seen in Q4 2024 data, especially in December. For Q1, CSIAM reports 38,172 Euro 5 + unit registrations, which was-21.6 % down on the year-ago data. However, by the end of Q2, the H1 data show registrations in France ' recovering ' to ' just '-17.8 % YTD at 94,49. So, the ' Half term ' school report? Forecasts of our demise are greatly exaggerated!
Robin Bradley Publisher robin @ dealer-world. com