The UK January new car registration market rose 11.5% year-on-year compared to the opening month of 2012, with private sales up by 15.9%, according to figures from the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT).

A total of 143,643 new cars were registered in January, of which 61,075 were private sales, a growth of 1.6ppts to a market share of 42.5%. The private market share was also up on December’s figure of 41.3%.

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Ford remained the best-selling brand in the UK with 19,640 registrations, a year-on-year drop of 2.10%. The figure includes 7,906 registrations of the Fiesta and 5,794 of the Focus, the first and second best-selling models in the market.

The top four models in the market were the same as in December 2012, although in a rearranged order, with third and fourth spot taken by 5,462 Astra and 5,178 Corsa sales, and Vauxhall remaining the second best-selling brand with 18,523 new sales, overall, a massive climb of 50.73% on its January 2012 figure.

Volkswagen, which announced a PCP offer on the Up! city car model for Q1 in January, remained the third best-selling brand despite a slight dip in new sales to 11,560 units.

Audi also recorded a positive month with 15.01% growth to 9,848 registrations and a 6.86% market share, well ahead of BMW, with which it regularly competes for fourth place by sales volume.

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Nissan, however, recorded the biggest growth of any brand with over 1,000 registrations for the month, up 50.79% year-on-year to 9,477 units, a 6.60% market share. The Japanese brand was the fifth best-selling marque in January, compared to 2012 as a whole when it was sixth.

Brands with Q1 finance deals

Of those brands to launch specific pre-launch registration finance offers for the opening quarter of 2013, Mazda recorded 20.18% growth to 2,144 registrations and 1.49% market share (up 0.11ppts) and Fiat sales grew by 16.11% to 3,351 units and 2.33% market share (down 0.09ppts).

The revitalised aim of Kia to become a 100,000 annual new sales brand, including offers on a range of models, began with 4.46% growth to 4,473 units in January and 3.11% market share, a drop of 0.21ppts.

Meanwhile, SsangYong, also extending a finance offer for Q1, recorded 28 new sales, down from 43 in January 2012.

New market entrant Dacia, the Romanian brand owned by Renault which came to market with the Duster and Sandero on PCP offers and an estimated decent residual value, recorded 294 registrations in its first month reported by the SMMT.

richard.brown@timetric.com