Automakers are benefiting from the introduction of more fuel-efficient vehicles. GM said it sold more than 1 million vehicles in the United States last year that achieve an EPA-estimated 30 mpg or more on the highway.

Toyota Motor said its hybrid-vehicle volume jumped nearly 83 percent last year, with sales of the expanded Prius family rising 75 percent to 236,000.

Honda Civic enjoyed its best sales year ever, the automaker said. (Photo: Honda)

Ford said its small car sales soared 29 percent to 316,006 units last year, including 13,309 deliveries of the new C-Max hybrid.

Honda said the Civic set a December sales record of 33,118 units, up 61 percent from 2011.

Fiat led all Chrysler brands with a 59 percent gain last month, the company said. For 2012, Fiat's U.S. sales of the 500 mini car line more than doubled to 43,772.

December sales rose 26 percent at Dodge and 16 percent at the Ram brand, but Jeep volume slipped for the third consecutive month, reflecting the end of Liberty production in August.
Chrysler's car sales rose 30 percent last month while light-truck deliveries increased 4 percent.
For all of 2012, Chrysler's U.S. sales increased 21 percent to 1.65 million.

It was the 33rd straight month Chrysler has posted an increase in U.S. sales as the automaker heads toward its third consecutive year of market-share gains. Chrysler's share of U.S. sales stood at 11.4 percent through November, up from 10.7 percent during the same period of 2011.

Hyundai's U.S. sales rose 17 percent in December and gained 9 percent in 2012, CEO John Krafcik said Hyundai sold 59,435 vehicles last month and a record-setting 703,007 units last year.

At Nissan Motor Co., December sales slipped 2 percent, with volume at the Nissan brand down 4 percent and Infiniti up 15 percent. For all of 2012, Nissan Motor's U.S. sales rose 10 percent, with the Nissan brand setting a sales record of 1.02 million.

Kia Motors' U.S. sales declined for the first time in more than two years, dropping 10 percent last month to 39,178 vehicles. The automaker's previous monthly drop was in August 2010, when industry-wide sales results were skewed by numbers inflated a year earlier by the U.S. government's Cash for Clunkers vehicle scrappage program.

Despite the dip last month, Kia sold a record 557,599 vehicles in the U.S. market in 2012, a 15 percent increase over last year.

Pent-up demand, holiday deals, low-rate financing and easing credit terms are driving the industry's sales.

"People are much more confident about jobs; banks and other credit institutions are much more willing to lend," Mustafa Mohatarem, GM's chief economist, said Thursday. "You're seeing the customer continue to come back into the marketplace."

Jesse Toprak, chief market analyst for TrueCar, said the latest car and truck models, often equipped with more features, are also compelling U.S. consumers to consider a new-vehicle purchase.

U.S. consumers continue to replace cars and trucks that are, on average, the oldest ever on America's roads. The average age of vehicles on U.S. roads is about 11 years, according to researchers at Experian Automotive and R.L. Polk & Co.

"It sure feels a lot better to be selling cars today than a few years ago," Geoffrey Pohanka, president of the Pohanka Automotive Group, told Bloomberg. "The age of the fleet and the attractiveness of a lot of cars that are being designed now are going to help sustain sales going forward."

Lingering replacement demand from owners of damaged vehicles and purchases deferred by superstorm Sandy on the East Coast may have boosted vehicle sales by about 50,000 in December, Credit Suisse Group AG estimated in a report late last month.

Many luxury brands offer year-end and holiday specials to drive showroom traffic and sales.
For example, Porsche's U.S. sales rose 61 percent in December. For all of 2012, sales rose 21 percent to a record 35,043 vehicles, topping Porsche's previous peak of 34,693 in 2007.

This story originally appeared at Autonews.com.