Daily Auto News May Auto Sales — American Cars Making a Comeback
Daily Auto News
All three major U.S. automakers beat expectations in May, with higher sales than most analysts had projected for the first time since the current recession began.
The Washington Post reports, “May sales of Ford and General Motors vehicles were down sharply compared to May 2008 but did not drop as low as forecasters expected, as the two automakers showed surprising resilience to the ongoing troubles in the U.S. auto industry.” GM saw sales decrease 29.6 percent compared to May of last year, while Ford saw sales drop 21.3 percent. Both automakers, however, had projected sales drops of 30 percent or more – and both saw a sales increase from April despite one less selling day in May.
Chrysler, the AP notes, “said Tuesday its May U.S. sales tumbled 46.9 percent, as the company wrapped up its first month under Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.” However, “the drop included a 90 percent drop in fleet sales as a result of its production shutdown stemming from its bankruptcy protection filing.” Retail sales fell just 30 percent compared to May of last year – a better performance than most industry analysts had expected.
However, Reuters cautions, “A late month surge in sales from Chrysler dealerships that are losing their franchises as part of the automaker’s bankruptcy” may be the key to Chrysler’s numbers – perhaps meaning the bump isn’t sustainable.
Bloomberg reports, “Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co. posted sales declines of more than 40 percent in May from a year earlier, when they were aided by rising fuel prices, as Asian automakers lost U.S. market share for the first time in 2009.” Toyota still sold more vehicles than any other automaker in the U.S. last month.
But because the Japanese automakers’ sales slipped farther than their U.S. counterparts in May, America’s companies gained market share. CNN Money notes, “GM’s market share increased last month, and Ford Motor Co.’s May sales helped it to climb to its highest market share in three years.”
Motor Trend, however, cautions that Asian automakers may have lost market share only because their proportion of the U.S. market was so inflated one year ago. “Thanks to gas prices last year, the Japanese manufacturers were stronger a year ago than the domestics,” they write. “They had more space to fall.”
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