New Vehicle Sales Expected to Lift in January, Edmunds Forecasts

Staff Report

Monday, January 28th, 2019

Edmunds forecasts that 1,169,804 new cars and trucks will be sold in the U.S. in January for an estimated seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of 17.2 million. This reflects a 28.1 percent decrease in sales from December 2018, but a 1.3 percent increase from January 2018.

"January's sales strength shows car shoppers are still feeling optimistic, even in the midst of the government shutdown and talk of a slowing economy," said Jeremy Acevedo, Edmunds' manager of industry analysis. "But despite this positive start, January is such a slow sales month that it doesn't carry much weight when it comes to predicting the health of the auto market for the full year."

Edmunds estimates that retail SAAR will come in at 13.9 million vehicles in January 2019, with fleet transactions accounting for 19.7 percent of total sales. An estimated 3.1 million used vehicles will be sold in January 2019, for a SAAR of 39.2 million (compared to 2.7 million —  or a SAAR of 39.7  million —  in December).

SALES VOLUME FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER

           

Sales
Volume

January 2019
Forecast

January
2018

December
2018

Change from
January 2018

Change from
December 2018

GM*

193,348

198,548

293,680

-2.6%

-34.2%

Ford

178,904

160,411

219,632

11.5%

-18.5%

Toyota

162,960

167,052

220,908

-2.4%

-26.2%

Fiat Chrysler

136,690

132,803

196,520

2.9%

-30.4%

Honda

111,135

104,542

155,115

6.3%

-28.4%

Nissan

104,737

123,538

148,720

-15.2%

-29.6%

Hyundai/Kia

82,203

76,870

113,149

6.9%

-27.4%

VW/Audi

36,132

39,255

54,812

-8.0%

-34.1%

Tesla

17,167

-

-

-

-

Industry

1,169,804

1,155,313

1,627,597

1.3%

-28.1%

 

*GM sales totals for December 2018 are estimated

 

**NOTE: January 2019 had 25 selling days, January 2018 had 25 and December 2018 had 26.

MARKET SHARE FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER

 

Market
Share

January 2019
Forecast

January
2018

December
2018

Change from
January 2018

Change from
December 2018

GM

16.5%

17.2%

18.0%

-0.7%

-1.5%

Ford

15.3%

13.9%

13.5%

1.4%

1.8%

Toyota

13.9%

14.5%

13.6%

-0.5%

0.4%

Fiat Chrysler

11.7%

11.5%

12.1%

0.2%

-0.4%

Honda

9.5%

9.0%

9.5%

0.5%

0.0%

Nissan

9.0%

10.7%

9.1%

-1.7%

-0.2%

Hyundai/Kia

7.0%

6.7%

7.0%

0.4%

0.1%

VW/Audi

3.1%

3.4%

3.4%

-0.3%

-0.3%

Tesla

1.5%

-

-

-

-