In mid-to-late June, a large number of US dealer management systems could not be used normally for nearly two weeks, resulting in some terminal orders could not be successfully completed.
It was thought that this would significantly increase sales in July, resulting in a substantial increase.
However, the reality is not optimistic.
Since most car companies no longer report monthly sales, they can only understand the performance of the US auto market at the end of the quarter through preliminary statistics from major institutions. J.D. Power and GlobalData, for example, estimate that retail sales of light vehicles in the US rose 5 per cent in July from a year earlier, while fleet sales fell 33 per cent.
Other analysts believe that, in fact, total sales in the end market will grow by 1% to 3%.
In terms of seasonally adjusted annualized sales rates, combined with data from Cox Automotive, Snapp Global Mobility, J.D.Power and GlobalData, the SAAR of US light vehicles in July is expected to be 16 million to 16.
7 million, up slightly from 15.
5 million in June, but only roughly the same as 16 million in the same period last year.
Indeed, with the gradual recovery of the supply chain, sales in the US light vehicle market continued to grow last year, with double-digit growth in the past half of the month, and eventually returned to more than 15 million vehicles for the whole year.
Coupled with high prices and high lending rates, various factors put more pressure on the growth of the US auto market this year, which fell in April.
It can be seen that after the cumulative year-on-year growth narrowed to 2.
2% in the first half of this year, the growth rate of light vehicles in the United States will continue to slow in the second half of this year.
Hybrid power has become the main driver of growth, and it is true in terms of the performance of the seven car companies that report monthly sales.
In turn, after a slight decline of 1.
2% in June, Toyota continued to decline in July, with the decline widening to 5.1%. This is mainly because sales of some of Toyota’s best-selling models have fallen to varying degrees, such as the Corolla 7.
6 per cent and Camry 3.
2 per cent, and the most popular RAV4 has also fallen 5.
9 per cent.
Meanwhile, sales of Lexus, the group’s luxury brand, rose 16.
1 per cent year-on-year, driven by RX, NX, GX and the new RZ.
It is worth mentioning that Toyota’s sales of electric vehicles (including hybrids) increased by 45% compared with the same period last year.
Ford’s situation is roughly in line with Toyota’s.
Although sales of electric and hybrid models have increased significantly, the group’s sales fell slightly in July because they were too small to fully make up for the loss caused by the decline in traditional fuel vehicles.
Take the group’s most popular Ford F-series, for example, even though sales of the Fmuri 150 Lightning rose 82 per cent in July from a year earlier, sales of the entire series rose only 0.
7 per cent.
At the brand level, Ford’s luxury brand Lincoln rose 14.
1% in July from a year earlier, creating an advantage of nearly 1,000 vehicles and narrowing the group’s decline.
Hyundai-Kia’s decline was dragged down by the Kia brand.
Asia experienced a highlight moment of more than 70,000 vehicles for four consecutive months from May to August last year, but this year it has become an insurmountable mountain, with only May being positive in the first seven months of this year.
Behind this performance is not only the continued weak Soul delivery and Rio shutdown, as well as a sharp decline in K5, but also a decline in sales of almost all traditional fuel vehicles.
In July, among Kia’s many traditional fuel products, only Seltos and Sportage were positive year-on-year, with increases of 4.
4% and 6.
5%, respectively.
So, even though recent EV9 monthly sales have remained at a high of 2000 vehicles, Kia’s overall sales are still lower than those of the same period last year.
Hyundai, by contrast, fared much better, with sales of some of its hybrid models growing, such as 13% of Elantra and 75% of Santa Fe, plus Palisade up 50% year-on-year, resulting in a 4.
0% increase in brand sales over the same period last year.
Honda, Subaru and Mazda are a different story.
Although Honda’s growth rate has slowed significantly compared with last year, the group’s overall sales rose 8.
0% in July, thanks to the continued rise in sales of its hybrid models.
Honda officially said that nearly half of its CR-V sold in July were hybrids, while Accord reached 51%, so total sales of the former rose 3.
4% year-on-year to 34216, while sales of the latter fell 21.
6% year-on-year to 14004 as the Marisville plant in Ohio was revamping the production of electric cars.
Subaru’s monthly sales have been growing year-on-year since July 2022, with its best-selling model, the Crosstrek, up 36.
3% to 15318 vehicles in July.
As sales of CX-50 and CX-90 continued to rise, coupled with the steady development of CX-5 and CX-30, Mazda gained 39866 vehicles in July.
This is the best performance in the history of Mazda’s entry into the US market in the same period, and it is also the highest in nearly three years.
Stellantis, which is caught in a dilemma, is precisely due to the slowing growth of trading volume in the end market.
According to Cox Automotive, the inventory of new light vehicles by car companies and dealers reached 2.
9 million as of mid-July, an increase of 49% over the same period last year and an increase of 966000 over the same period last year.
Considering that the recent monthly sales of new light vehicles in the United States are about 13 to 1.
4 million, this means that the inventory of nearly 3 million vehicles will take at least more than two months to be digested, and car companies will continue to produce during this period.
To this end, some car companies have adjusted their production plans for the second half of the year.
In the case of the seven car companies that report monthly sales, for example, the number of cars in their new car inventory is equivalent to 36 days of supply, and the number of pickups and SUV has reached 54 days, a significant increase from the previous month, the agency said.
Among them, Toyota is the only one of the seven companies that reported monthly sales with inventory less than a month’s demand, while Mazda’s inventory of new cars decreased month-on-month in June.
Among the rest of the car companies, Stellantis and Nissan have higher inventory of new cars, and the former has the highest inventory level in the industry, and its Jeep and Ram inventory can meet the supply for nearly five months.
Indeed, in the first half of this year, for example, Stellantis sold about 682000 vehicles in the United States, down 15% from a year earlier, a decrease of 125000 vehicles.
This also prevented Stellantis from becoming the fifth largest car company in the US light vehicle market, and was replaced by Honda with an advantage of about 8000 vehicles.
Specifically, sales of Jeep and Ram, the two pillar brands of Stellantis, fell 9.
3% and 25.
8% respectively in the first half of the year compared with the same period last year, with the latter alone losing 70000 vehicles, or even more than half of the group’s loss.
And behind this performance is the first half of the yearAs sales in the U.S. pickup truck market fell, although Ram pickup trucks continued to win the third-place title in this segment, sales fell directly by 20% year-on-year to 180,000 units.
This is the first time in recent years that Ram has fallen below 200,000 units in the first half of the year, which also led to Stellantis’s pickup truck sales in the first half of the year being only 203,000 units, a year-on-year decrease of 19%.
According to the previously announced first-half financial report, the significant decrease in sales of the most profitable pickup trucks led to the most obvious decline in profit margins in Stellantis North America, which should have been the group’s most profitable regional market, seriously affecting the group’s revenue and profits.
In order to solve this series of problems, Stellantis will reduce production and reduce prices.
Natalie Knight, the group’s chief financial officer, also said that the group will also re-launch some models that have been withdrawn from the United States, such as the Dodge Charger.
In fact, Stellantis had begun to adjust its product matrix and prices as early as the second quarter.
Sales in the second quarter increased by 12,453 units compared with the first quarter.
Unfortunately, it still failed to change the downward trend.
In recent years, Stellantis sales in the U.S. market have been falling continuously.
Even if prices are ultimately exchanged for increased sales, profit margins in North America and even the entire group will drop significantly.
From this point of view, Stellantis is indeed caught in a dilemma between sales volume and profit.
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