Filed under: Plants/Manufacturing, Earnings/Financials

After gathering real-time transaction data from 8,900 automotive franchisees across the U.S., J.D. Power and Associates predicts new-vehicle retail sales will have declined for January 2010 compared to one year ago. January's new-vehicle sales are expected to come in at 500,900 units, which represents a seasonally adjusted annualized rate (SAAR) of 7.9 million units. In January of 2009, the SAAR was 8.8 million units. December 2009 was a particularly strong sales month - thanks to heavy marketing and aggressive incentive programs - making it a tough act to follow. To wit:

"January is typically a weak selling month, but this month is particularly impacted by December's strong close and extra selling weekend," said Jeff Schuster, executive director of global forecasting at J.D. Power and Associates. "However, the sales pace has been improving as January continues, which is an encouraging sign for the recovering industry."

Not to be confused with new-vehicle retail sales, fleet sales are expected to increase significantly when compared to the same slow period last year. When fleet- and new-vehicle units are combined, the month's outlook is more promising. According to J.D. Power, total sales for January 2010 are projected at 659,000 units, up nine percent from the same month last year. Carried forward, the global marketing firm is predicting 2010 total vehicles sales at 11.5 million - and these numbers may be even higher as the industry recovers, thereby loosening credit and improving leasing availability. Check out the press release after the jump.

[Source: J.D. Power and Associates]Continue reading J.D. Power data suggests January U.S. new-vehicle retail sales decline from last month

J.D. Power data suggests January U.S. new-vehicle retail sales decline from last month originally appeared on Autoblog on Sun, 31 Jan 2010 11:16:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.



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