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January Truck and SUV Sales Extend Auto Industry Momentum


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SANTA MONICA, CA -- Jan. 29, 2015: Edmunds.com, forecasts that 1,155,866 new cars and trucks will be sold in the U.S. in January for an estimated Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate (SAAR) of 16.7 million. The projected sales will be a 23.1 percent decrease from December 2014, but a 14.4 percent increase from January 2014.

"New car shoppers, seemingly inspired by winter weather and low gas prices, are buying up trucks and SUVs – particularly smaller ones," commented Jessica Caldwell, Senior Analyst for car shopping website Edmunds.com, whose team produced an insightful report on compact SUVs at Insights "At this point, most automakers and dealers offer products in these popular segments and are able to benefit from the trend."

SALES VOLUME FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER

SALES VOLUME FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER







Sales Volume

January
2015 Forecast

January 2014

December 2014

Change from January 2014

Change from December 2014

GM

200,062

171,486

274,483

16.7%

-27.1%

Ford

180,813

153,494

219,369

17.8%

-17.6%

Toyota

168,002

146,365

215,057

14.8%

-21.9%

Chrysler Group

143,975

127,183

193,261

13.2%

-25.5%

Honda

103,797

91,631

137,280

13.3%

-24.4%

Nissan

100,386

90,470

117,318

11.0%

-14.4%

Hyundai/Kia

89,649

81,016

110,094

10.7%

-18.6%

VW/Audi

37,794

33,595

53,116

12.5%

-28.8%

Industry

1,155,866

1,010,074

1,503,321

14.4%

-23.1%

*NOTE: January 2015 had 26 selling days, while
January 2014 had 25 and December 2014 had 26.
This analysis is unadjusted for that difference.

Edmunds.com estimates that retail SAAR will come in at 13.8 million vehicles in January, with fleet transactions accounting for 17.4 percent of total sales. An estimated 2.9 million used cars will be sold in January, for a SAAR of 35.8 million (compared to 2.4 million – or a SAAR of 35.6 million – used car sales in December).

MARKET SHARE FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER







Market Share

January
2015
Forecast

January
2014

December
2014

Change from
January 2014

Change from
December 2014

GM

17.3%

17.0%

18.3%

0.3%

-1.0%

Ford

15.6%

15.2%

14.6%

0.4%

1.1%

Toyota

14.5%

14.5%

14.3%

0.0%

0.2%

Chrysler Group

12.5%

12.6%

12.9%

-0.1%

-0.4%

Honda

9.0%

9.1%

9.1%

-0.1%

-0.2%

Nissan

8.7%

9.0%

7.8%

-0.3%

0.9%

Hyundai/Kia

7.8%

8.0%

7.3%

-0.3%

0.4%

VW/Audi

3.3%

3.3%

3.5%

-0.1%

-0.3%