A spike in petrol prices triggered by the war in West Asia has boosted sales of used electric vehicles (EVs) across Europe, online car platforms told Reuters, in an early sign that the global energy crisis is pushing consumers away from combustion engines.
Terje Dahlgren, an analyst at Norway’s largest used-car marketplace Finn.no, said that EVs have recently overtaken diesel models as the site’s best-selling fuel type.
“What’s particularly telling is that EV interest was already trending upward before recent events,” Olx CEO Christian Gisy said. “The instability appears to have accelerated a transition that was already underway.”
The war, which erupted on February 28, has blocked tanker traffic at the Strait of Hormuz, which carries roughly 20% of global oil supplies.
That has fed straight through to filling-station prices, with the average cost of petrol in the European Union rising 12% to 1.48 euros ($2.12) per litre from February 23 to March 16, according to European Commission data.
Used EV Sales First To React To Energy Crises
French online used-car retailer Aramisauto said its share of EV sales almost doubled from the week starting February 16 to the week starting March 9, rising to 12.7% from 6.5%. Over the same duration, petrol models saw a sudden drop from 34% sales to 28%, while diesel fell from 14% to 10%.
Majority-owned by automaker Stellantis, the company saw a similar shift in 2022 when Russia invaded Ukraine, and energy prices jumped, CEO Romain Boscher said.
If petrol prices in the U.S. and Europe remain high, new-car buyers are also expected to flock towards EVs and hybrids.
Used EV sales tend to react quickly to shifts in petrol prices because they can be up to 40% cheaper than new models and readily available compared to new cars that can take months to deliver.
“Considering the lead time of a vehicle purchase, we expect this momentum to continue as the market fully absorbs the impact of recent global events,” said Alastair Campbell, vice president of growth at British automotive data firm Marketcheck.
Shift Seen Across Europe
Amsterdam-based Olx said customer enquiries for EVs have jumped across its marketplaces in France (50%), Romania (40%), Portugal (54%), and Poland (39%), with growth “accelerating consistently week-over-week across all markets”.
In the Nordics, the largest used car websites—all owned by Norway’s Vend—also recorded a jump in EV sales.
Swedish platform Blocket showed a rise of 11% in EV sales in the first two weeks of March versus the last two weeks, while views of EV models spiked by 17%.
Denmark also shows a similar pattern. Local used car platform Bilbasen reported a rise in searches for EVs, and car analyst Jan Lang cited higher petrol prices as the reason.
In Germany, mobile.de, the country’s largest online car market, said the share of EV searches on its website has tripled, from 12% to 36%, since the start of March. Meanwhile, car dealers received 66% more enquiries for used EVs in February.
(With inputs from Reuters)
