Econoday Economic Report: Motor Vehicle Sales

2012 Economic Calendar

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Motor Vehicle Sales

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Released On 4/26/2012 8:00:00 PM For Apr, 2012

	Prior	Consensus	Consensus Range	Actual
Domestic Vehicle Sales	10.9 M	11.0 M	10.9 M to 11.3 M	10.9 M
Total Vehicle Sales	14.4 M	14.4 M	14.0 M to 14.8 M	14.4 M

Highlights
Sales of cars and light trucks were steady in April compared to March, offering a neutral signal for the motor vehicle component of the April retail sales report. Sales, expressed by manufacturers in units, came in at a 14.4 million annual rate, unchanged from the rate in March. The breakdown shows slight strength on the truck side and slight slowing for cars, but such details may overstate the forecasting usefulness of unit sales, at least lately. Unit sales and sales in the government's motor vehicle component, which are in dollars, do track together over time but lately the upward slope for retail sales is much steeper than for unit sales. This may be an indication of pricing power and help explain why retail sales for vehicles in March show a big monthly gain at the same time that unit sales declined.

Market Consensus before announcement
Sales of total light motor vehicles in March dropped a sharp 4.8 percent, but followed a surge of 6.5 percent in February. Despite the very negative monthly change, the March level of 14.5 million units annualized was still quite healthy. Domestics in the latest month declined 4.3 percent to 10.9 million units annualized.

Definition
Unit sales of motor vehicles include domestic sales and foreign sales, otherwise referred to as imports. Domestics are sales of autos produced in the U.S., Canada, and Mexico. Imports are U.S. sales of vehicles produced elsewhere. These are for light vehicles which include all passenger cars and light trucks up to 14,000 pounds gross weight (including minivans and sport utility vehicles). Individual manufacturers usually report sales on the first business day of the month. One of the first tabulators of the data is Autodata Corporation. Motor vehicle sales are good indicators of trends in consumer spending and often are considered a leading indicator at business cycle turning points. Why Investors Care

Motor vehicles sales slowed notably in 2008 and 2009 due to recession. Recovery boosted sales in 2010 and early 2011 before economic growth slowed. Truck shares hit their peak in 2005 when gasoline was cheap. Trucks have since oscillated sharply with spikes in gasoline in 2008 and 2010.
Data Source: Haver Analytics

2012 Released Schedule

Released On: 1/4 2/1 3/1 4/3 5/1 6/1 7/3 8/1 9/4 10/2 11/1 12/3

Release For: Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Nov