Truck market, December ends on a positive note, but not 2024

Back to growalbeit very timidly, the heavy vehicle market will exceed 3.5 t of GVM in December 2024. But it is still a variation below the full figure and, therefore, not sufficient to avoid the announced negative sign in the total figure ‘year.

Also in this case it is a “minus” compared to 2023, almost irrelevant from a practical point of view but psychologically quite heavy to digest and above all not auspicious for the year that is about to open, in which the difficulties in the sector will emerge even more, according to the analysis by UNRAE which also provided this data.

The data in detail

In the month of December the industrial vehicle market recorded a slight increase, with 1,872 registrations compared to 1,859 in 2023 (+0.7%). However, the segment of heavy vehicles with a mass equal to or greater than 16 t is undergoing a 8.6% drop on a monthly basis. On the contrary, registrations of light vehicles up to 6 t doubled compared to December last year, while medium-light vehicles, in the range between 6.01 and 15.99 t, recorded an increase of 33.3%.

Over the course of twelve months of 2024the consolidated data reflects a slight deficit of 0.7%, with around 200 fewer units registered than in 2023. At the sector level, the light vehicles recorded a significant increase of 27.8%, while medium-light and heavy vehicles showed a contraction of 1.7% and 1.5% respectively.

A predictable scenario

According to Paolo A. Starace, President of the Industrial Vehicles Section of UNRAE, December marked the end of a year with two facescharacterized by a first half-year growth of 11.5% compared to the same period of 2023, followed by a second half-year marked by a significant decline of 14.2%.

Starace underlined that such a scenario had been widely expectedwhich is why they were requested targeted interventions to mitigate its effects. However, these appeals, which remained unheard, should now become one priority on the Government’s agenda to prevent the negative trend from persisting throughout 2025.

Is there a crisis looming among trucks too?

On the other hand, the sector has difficulties deep roots and cannot be attributed to the green transition process. Although zero-emission vehicle registrations are grew by 119.6%almost all of the vehicles sold are still represented by vehicles with internal combustion engines (99,3%).

Furthermore, as the deadline for the assigned CO2 emissions reduction targets approaches exclusively to the Manufacturers and in light of the recent statements by the EU Climate Commissioner, Frans Timmermans, there is a risk that they will adopt protective measures which could distort the market. For this reason, Starace underlined the urgency of becoming aware of the possible repercussions of this scenario, also on employment (see automotive sector).

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