WRAPUP 3-European car sales up in January, outlook bleaker

* French January car sales up 14 percent

* Italian January car sales up 30.2 percent

* Spanish January car sales up 18.1 percent

* Spanish sales seen down in H2 -ANFAC

* U.S., German car sales due Tuesday

(Adds Italian, Belgian sales)

By Helen Massy-Beresford and Maria Sheahan

PARIS/MILAN, Feb 1 (Reuters) - Car sales rose strongly in France, Italy and Spain last month thanks to scrapping incentives, but carmakers face the uncertainty of subsidies running out in some key markets.

Scrapping schemes have revived the European car market, which managed a fall of just 1.6 percent in 2009 sales, [ID:nFAB015385], despite a crisis that pushed two U.S. carmakers into bankruptcy and sparked consolidation across the industry.

But as incentives run out in some markets, carmakers and industry groups are fearful of much sharper falls.

Italian car sales rose 30.2 percent in January, while Fiat (FIA.MI) sales were up 30.4 percent, leaving it with a 32 percent market share, according to a Reuters calculation.

However, new car orders fell 10 percent to around 125,000 vehicles in January, foreign carmakers' association UNRAE said.

Italian thinktank Promotor said dealers had reported a dramatic fall in visitors to showrooms -- in December only 16 percent reported low visitor numbers, compared with 78 percent in January.

"If the government does not take any decision on incentives in 2010 orders will continue to be very depressed and there could be a dramatic collapse of new car sales in March," Promotor said.

UNRAE said the "very low" level of orders was worrying for the whole industry in Italy, as drivers waited for a decision on the future of the country's buyer incentives.

WITHDRAWAL SYMPTOMS

Italian industry minister Claudio Scajola said last week that incentives "are a drug and long-term they destabilise the market." Nevertheless details on extending the scrappage scheme in Italy are expected in mid-February. [ID:nLDE60Q0UW]

A source close to Fiat told Reuters its orders were down around 50 percent in January compared with the last few months and Fiat (FIA.MI) chief executive Sergio Marchionne has warned that the European market could fall 16 percent in 2010 if incentives are not renewed.

French car sales rose 14 percent in January, carmakers' association the CCFA said earlier on Monday. Adjusted for the same number of working days, the rise was 19.7 percent. The comparative figure in 2009 was itself a drop of 7.9 percent on sales in January 2008.

"The first half could be quite positive. As far as the second half is concerned, there is a big question mark -- everything will depend on the recovery in economic activity," said a spokesman for the CCFA.

Societe Generale analyst Eric-Alain Michelis said the January results in France were "not bad at all".

The results were still reflecting orders placed in 2009, before the scrappage bonus offered in France was reduced, he said. "If the carmakers' three-month order books are to be believed, this effect should last for the whole first quarter," he said.

France's largest carmaker and Europe's number two, PSA Peugeot Citroen (PEUP.PA), saw January sales rise 17.9 percent, while smaller rival Renault (RENA.PA) managed a 59.1 percent boost year-on-year.

Meanwhile, in Spain car sales rose 18.1 percent in January, but are expected to fall in the second half of 2010, as government subsidies -- introduced in that market in May -- fade away and a VAT tax hike kicks in, carmakers' association ANFAC said on Monday.

"In the second half of the year sales will be negative, with falls of over 18 percent as a result of the 2 percentage point rise in VAT and an end to government subsidies," ANFAC said in a statement. [ID:nLDE6100UY]

In Belgium, car sales rose 3.54 percent year-on-year in January. [ID:nBRE003595]

Germany, Europe's largest car market, is expected to show the continuing negative effect of ending its scrappage scheme in September, when data is released on Tuesday, but sales are unlikely to fall relative to January 2009, when sales were down 14 percent on the same period in 2008.

U.S. car sales data due out on Tuesday is expected to give early details of the impact on the world's biggest automaker Toyota Motor Corp (7203.T) of its U.S. sales freeze and massive safety recall. U.S. car sales for January are expected to be higher than January 2009 but lower than December 2009 on an annualised sales rate basis.

Earlier on Monday, the Japan Automobile Dealers' Association released data showing that automobile sales rose 36.8 percent in January, excluding sales of 660cc minivehicles.

For more on Toyota, click on [ID:nN27231388] (Additional reporting by Gilles Guillaume, Antonia van de Velde, Nigel Davies and Gianni Montani; Editing by Will Waterman, Greg Mahlich)