CARY, N.C. -

Here’s an encouraging sign for the Canadian used-car market from June: at least two automaker programs had their strongest months ever for certified pre-owned, and a third, is gaining ground.

Starting with Hyundai, it reported its strongest certified pre-owned sales month of all time, selling 1,246 certified vehicles in June.

That’s a 26% year-over-year hike and it put the first-half total at 4,964 units.  The year-to-date tally is down 3% from 2019.

“2020 has been a challenging year for everyone.  While Hyundai’s H-Promise CPO program started off strong with 41% and 66% increases in January and February respectively vs 2019, March sales were down 6% and April was down a whopping 74% vs last year,” Charles Plewes, who is manager of CPO and remarketing national sales at Hyundai Auto Canada Corp., said in emailed comments.

“Still, this was better than most of the competition.  However, with dealers opening back up in May, along with some pent-up demand, Hyundai saw sales down only 21% vs. 2019,” Plewes said.

“By contrast, June was an outstanding month for Hyundai’s CPO program with dealers more fully open, sales surged to 1246, our best month ever, beating a record from way back in 2013 by 6%.  Sales so far in July have continued this strong momentum adding to the recovery.”

Also hitting records in June was Mercedes-Benz Canada.

A company spokesperson said via email that June was a best-ever for both Mercedes-Benz CPO and for its overall pre-owned sales.

In a news release, Mercedes-Benz said the “very encouraging” pre-owned operations in June followed some “challenging” figures from the early and middle portions of the second quarter.

Mercedes-Benz had 3,673 overall pre-owned sales in Q2, a 17.9% dip. It moved 3,186 CPO units in the quarter, down 16.6%.

But the automaker also pointed out that CPO penetration remained on the upward trend, climbing 1.4%.

Next up, Nissan sold 1,042 certified vehicles in June, down from 1,345 a year ago. Year-to-date sales are at 4,945 units, compared to 7,696 in the first half of 2019.

Infiniti beat year-ago figures (173) in June, moving 176 CPO units. Through six months, it has sold 717 certified vehicles, compared to 962 in the prior-year period.

Joel Gregory, who heads up CPO for both brands in Canada, noted that both Nissan and Infiniti are “showing signs of recovery” in certified.