USA June 2012: Chevrolet Malibu at highest in 32 years!

Chevrolet Malibu

* NOW UPDATED with the All models Top 262! Click on title to see *

The US car market continues on its excellent run this year and is up 22% year-on-year in June to 1,285,555 registrations, bringing the year-to-date total to 7,272,160 units, up a comforting 15% on 2011. Passenger cars are up 25% while light duty trucks including SUVs are up 19%, so extremely solid growth all round. After a serious scare during the GFC, General Motors goes from strength to strength and with 248,750 sales in June it delivers its highest monthly volume since September 2008.

The last time the Malibu nameplate sold over 30,000 monthly units was in 1979-1980.

The Ford F-Series enjoys its 34th consecutive month atop the models ranking with 55,025 sales and for the first time in 2012 the Chevrolet Silverado is up to #2 at 33,566 units, however still #3 year-to-date with 194,508 sales below the Toyota Camry, #3 this month at 32,107 units, up 50% year-on-year. The big event in June is the performance of the Chevrolet Malibu, #4 and missing out on the title of best-selling passenger car in the country for just 705 units thanks to 31,402 sales, its first time above the 30,000 monthly mark potentially since…1980! I don’t have monthly figures that go back that far but the Malibu finished 1979 with 344,233 sales and 1980 with 267,732 units, and must have sold over 30,000 monthly units at some stage during those 2 years, before falling below 250,000 annual sales ever since.

Ford Escape

The Honda Accord continues to handle 2012 much better than 2011, up 84% year-on-year to #5 with 28,914 sales, as does the Honda Civic up 57% to #7 and now #4 year-to-date vs. #12 in 2011… Notice also the Ford Escape up 6 spots on May to #6 with a best-ever 28,500 units thanks to the new generation now on sale, the Toyota Prius at #16 up 341% on a month of June 2011 still disrupted by the Japanese tsunami and the Toyota RAV4 up 66% to #20.

Scion FR-S

In other news, Audi manages to sell more cars than in any month since it entered the US market 42 years ago at 12,664 vehicles sold, beating the December 2011 record of 12,655. The Buick Verano breaks into the monthly US Top 100 for the first time at #89 while the Scion FR-S (aka Toyota GT86) is up a whopping 123 spots for its 2nd month of sales in the country to #117 with 2,680 sales. The Cadillac XTS lands at #186 and the Dodge Dart at #234.

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One year ago: USA June 2011: Chevrolet Cruze #3, best-selling passenger car!

Full June 2012 Top 262 Ranking Table below.