US Auto Sales Coming With Free Rope (GM, F, TM, HMC)

Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
By Douglas A. McIntyre Published
This post may contain links from our sponsors and affiliates, and Flywheel Publishing may receive compensation for actions taken through them.

On Tuesday, it won’t just be the first day of the month nor just the first day of the quarter.  It is yet another reporting day for new car and truck sales in the U.S. For Ford Motor (NYSE: F), General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM), Chrysler and so forth.  In a move that is becoming all too familiar, The Big Three might as well just count Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) and Honda Motor Co. Ltd. (NYSE: HMC) in there as these two are becoming larger and larger sellers in the U.S.

We have looked over the forecasts at Edmunds.com and seen forecast of The Big Three domestic  market share of 45.4% in June, which would be down from June 2007’s 51.4% but up from May 2007’s 45.3%.  Unfortunately it seems as though we are stuck with bad news for a whilein the US Auto sector.  As we noted over at Volume Spike, traders arestill betting against GM and Ford with options trading.

The latest individual estimates from Edmunds.com are expected to look grizzly:

  • GM will sell 240,000 vehicles in June, down 25.2% from June 2007 and down 10.8% from May 2008.
  • Ford will sell 181,000 vehicles in June, down 24.8% from June 2007 and down 15.2% from May 2008.
  • Chrysler will sell 126,000 vehicles, down 31.2% from June 2007 and down 15.0% from May 2008.
  • Toyota will sell 217,000 vehicles in June, down 11.7% from June 2007 and down 15.7% from May 2008.
  • Honda will sell 147,000 vehicles in June, up 4.0% from June 2007 and down 12.8% from May 2008.

These ghastly numbers are even worse if you do not adjust for the fewer number of selling days on the calendar if you look at the table that Edmunds.com gives there. 

It seems that 52-week lows day after day (actually multi-decade lows now) aren’t any interpreted floors.   

Jon C. Ogg
June 30, 2008

Photo of Douglas A. McIntyre
About the Author Douglas A. McIntyre →

Douglas A. McIntyre is the co-founder, chief executive officer and editor in chief of 24/7 Wall St. and 24/7 Tempo. He has held these jobs since 2006.

McIntyre has written thousands of articles for 24/7 Wall St. He is an expert on corporate finance, the automotive industry, media companies and international finance. He has edited articles on national demographics, sports, personal income and travel.

His work has been quoted or mentioned in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Los Angeles Times, The Washington Post, NBC News, Time, The New Yorker, HuffPost USA Today, Business Insider, Yahoo, AOL, MarketWatch, The Atlantic, Bloomberg, New York Post, Chicago Tribune, Forbes, The Guardian and many other major publications. McIntyre has been a guest on CNBC, the BBC and television and radio stations across the country.

A magna cum laude graduate of Harvard College, McIntyre also was president of The Harvard Advocate. Founded in 1866, the Advocate is the oldest college publication in the United States.

TheStreet.com, Comps.com and Edgar Online are some of the public companies for which McIntyre served on the board of directors. He was a Vicinity Corporation board member when the company was sold to Microsoft in 2002. He served on the audit committees of some of these companies.

McIntyre has been the CEO of FutureSource, a provider of trading terminals and news to commodities and futures traders. He was president of Switchboard, the online phone directory company. He served as chairman and CEO of On2 Technologies, the video compression company that provided video compression software for Adobe’s Flash. Google bought On2 in 2009.

Featured Reads

Our top personal finance-related articles today. Your wallet will thank you later.

Continue Reading

Top Gaining Stocks

CBOE Vol: 1,568,143
PSKY Vol: 12,285,993
STX Vol: 7,378,346
ORCL Vol: 26,317,675
DDOG Vol: 6,247,779

Top Losing Stocks

LKQ
LKQ Vol: 4,367,433
CLX Vol: 13,260,523
SYK Vol: 4,519,455
MHK Vol: 1,859,865
AMGN Vol: 3,818,618