OREANDA-NEWS. January 15, 2010. The Association of European Business does not expect the domestic automotive market to recover from its losses this year following a 49% decline in 2009. During the crisis year, a total of 1.46 mn cars were sold in Russia and this year AEB expects this metric to rise moderately, to 1.5 mn cars, said Martin Yan, Vice Chairman of the Automaker Committee of the Association. In addition, AEB projects capacity of the car market at 1.4 mn cars, with the remaining 100,000 to be light commercial vehicles.

 The expert added that the 2010 outlook is quite optimistic and is based on the assumption that state support measures, including beneficial lending and utilization premium, will be quite efficient. He expects “a moderate recovery of the market” in the second half of the year.