U.S. Sales Hold Up, Look Like Posting Healthy 2018 Total.
“We expect sales to decline only marginally in 2019 before stabilising at a relatively healthy annual rate of 16.8 million-16.9 million by 2020”
U.S. auto sales slipped 5.6 per cent in September, a bit better than predictions of a 7 per cent fall compared with the same month a year ago when sales jumped as buyers replaced cars destroyed by Hurricane Harvey.
The market remains strong, with predictions sales would soon fall off a cliff fading away. Forecasts now point to a year’s sales of just over 17 million again.
“This (relative) September bounce back, and expectations that the pace of sales in the 4th quarter should not move drastically from this level will likely push full-year light vehicle sales volume to 17.1 million units in total,” IHS Markit said.
S&P expects the good times to continue.
“Despite an increasing supply of late-model used vehicles and rising
new-vehicle prices, we expect sales to decline only marginally in 2019 before stabilising at a relatively healthy annual rate of 16.8 million-16.9 million by 2020.
“We believe an annual sales rate of around 16.5 million could represent a new normal for the industry beyond 2020 as demand becomes more challenging. This level is still about 11 per cent higher than the average annual sales of 14.8 million units in the U.S. between 1980 and 2017,” S&P said.
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