The Italian true fleet market saw its best July since 2008 while the Nissan Leaf also put in a notable performance, according to latest Dataforce research.

Nissan Leaf saw its highest-ever volume and market share in the Italian true fleet sector

Analysis by the firm’s Richard Worrow finds that the Italian true fleet sector saw more than 29,000 passenger car registrations and a double-digit growth rate of 11.3% in July. Overall the total market, which had one more working day than in July 17, recorded around 165,500 registrations, up 4.8%. Volumes in both dealerships/manufacturer (+6.6%) and short-term rentals (+3.4%) increased over July last year while the growth for the private market stood at 2.5%.

Fiat remained the best-selling true fleet manufacturer despite a 3.9% decline. Volkswagen rose 39.7%, jumping from rank number five into second position followed by Audi, Mercedes, Ford (all in the red), Renault and BMW.

Toyota rose two places to eighth with 63.4% growth. The performance of the C-HR and the Yaris helped the Japanese brand to achieve a new record market share of 5.2%. Nissan was up from rank number 15 to ninth with growth of 133.7%. Alfa Romeo took the last spot in the top 10 with a gap of less than 60 registrations to Peugeot in 11th place.

Dataforce also looked at the EV model ranking. This was topped by the Nissan Leaf, which saw its highest-ever volume and market share in true fleet, followed by the Smart ForTwo and Renault Zoe who both had impressive growth rates as well. In total the share of full electric vehicles climbed to 1.7% in July. Hybrids also saw strong demand with more than 2,200 new registrations (+151.1%) and a share of 7.5%.