In the first quarter, electric car maker Tesla Inc. stretched its lead in U.S. luxury new-vehicle registrations, outrunning last year’s segment leader, BMW, by 33,400 vehicles.
Tesla’s registrations surged 59 percent from a year earlier to 113,882 vehicles, Experian reported in its most recent tally. BMW registrations dipped 3.4 percent to 80,482.
For the first three months, Lexus registrations dropped 17 percent to 66,907, and Mercedes-Benz suffered a 21 percent drop to 60,632.
Among the top 15 luxury brands in Experian’s ranking, Infiniti saw the largest slide, with registrations tumbling 43 percent to 11,740. Rival Genesis reported 12,549 registrations, up 52 percent from the prior year.
The registration data includes models of all powertrains from the luxury automakers.
Tesla has been able to navigate the global supply chain crisis somewhat better than its rivals so far this year.
