Volkswagen's subsidiary Audi AG sees its car sales recovering to pre-pandemic levels sometime in 2022 or 2023, the company's chief executive officer Markus Duesmann told Handelsblatt.

"We certainly expect the coronavirus crisis to have longer-term effects," Deusmann warned, noting that the carmaker had "a very difficult second quarter."

The executive said that sales started to "slowly pick up" but are far from a sharp "V" recovery.