Italian bike market nose dives

Against the same month in 2008, motorcycle registrations fell by 35.4 per cent, scooters dropped by 38.6 per cent and mopeds were down by 43.6 per cent. The combined total was only 20,528 units - against 33,541 units in January last year. By comparison, the UK market declined by only 7.3 per cent in the first month of 2009.

And nobody’s apparently escaping the wrath of the recession. Senior management at previously-healthy Ducati have just swallowed a ‘voluntary’ ten per cent pay cut and agreed to give up their future bonuses as the premium end of the market starts to feel the pain as well.

Ducati hasn’t revealed sales figures for January or the final quarter of last year but US industry analysts estimate that the factory sold 8580 bikes in America during the whole of 2008 - down by nearly five per cent year-on-year. However, for the first nine months, the Ducati had been bragging about how its performance was firmly positive, bucking the US market trend. That trend obviously didn’t remain bucked into the final three months of the year.

Whether Ducati will ever release its financial results and worldwide registration figures again is open to question anyway. It is no longer obliged to do so since delisting from the Milan stock exchange in December and moving into the private ownership of the Bonomi family’s investment trust.