German luxury carmaker BMW has posted positive earnings for the third quarter of 2009, despite the ongoing difficulties in the global economy.

Norbert Reithofer, Chairman of the Board of Management of the BMW Group said that measures put in place to increase efficiency and reduce costs are taking effect.

He expected that earnings for the whole of 2009 would be positive but this prediction was made on the assumption that the global economy and conditions within car markets do not worsen before the end of the year.

However, sales of new cars were down on the same period last year, although the pace of sales volume decrease continued to slow in the third quarter compared to the preceding quarter.

The total number of BMW, MINI and Rolls-Royce brand vehicles delivered to customers in the period from July to September decreased by 7.2% to 324,100 units.

The BMW Group is cautiously optimistic about its outlook for 2010 and Reithofer went on to say the company expected markets to make a gradual recovery over the coming year.

The new BMW X1 and new BMW 5 Series Gran Turismo models should provide good momentum and this trend will be fuelled further between 2010 and 2012 when the new versions of high-selling models come onto the markets, Reithofer added.