Volkswagen's emissions scandal is still wreaking havoc with the company
Data released by European auto industry body the ACEA on Friday shows that 16.6% more cars were registered in the EU during December than in the previous month, and across the whole of 2015, people bought 9.3% more cars than in 2014.
Of the 1.1 million new cars bought in the final month of 2015, by the far the biggest sellers were cars manufactured by the Volkswagen group.
This might sound like positive news, but actually VW's market share has slumped from 25% in December 2014, to just 22.5% at the end of last year. On top of this, every single one of the Volkswagen group's brands lost market share.
VW itself lost the biggest chunk of its market share, with 0.9% of sales disappearing, while other Volkswagen owned brands like Audi, Seat, and Skoda all lost roughly 0.5% of their share of sales.
What's even worse for VW is that compared to all the other major European brands, it only managed to increase overall sales by a tiny margin. Sales by the company grew by 4.4% in December, which is pretty dreadful compared to the likes of Renault, which saw sales jump by 28.6%; BMW, which sold 19% more cars; and Peugeot, where 26.6% more cars were sold in December.
ACEA's figures come just a day after another car firm, Renault, was embroiled in a potential emissions scandal of its own. Shares in the French company plunged by more than 20% on Thursday after it was reported that French Fraud Office had seized computers from Renault offices in a series of raids.
More information about what's going on at Renault isn't known yet, but if it emerges that the company has been carrying out similar practices to Volkswagen, that 28.6% sales growth could well disappear.