BMW says it is continuing to set new records in vehicle sales, with the 3 Series continuing to take a lion's share of the glory.

Last month more than 66,000 cars were delivered worldwide - an increase of 8.6% compared to the same month last year - and in the year-to-date, the figure is 683,000 vehicles, representing an increase of, once more, 8.6%.

BMW says the success is largely due to the to the 3-series. More than 430,000 were sold up to October (an increase of 13.2%).

Sales of the new X5 Sports Activity Vehicle have exceeded 26,000 this year, with BMW claiming the total would have been higher had production capacity not been "completely exhausted".

Dr Michael Ganal, BMW AG sales director, said: "The BMW Group is moving steadily towards record sales worldwide. In many markets, we have been able to supply more vehicles to customers in the first 10 months of the year than in the whole of the 1999 business year."

BMW's confidence belies the disappointing sales performance for the year so far where sales are down year-to-date compared to 1999 by 6.24%