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New Vehicle Sales Drop in March to Close a Down First Quarter in 2020


Edmunds analysts forecast a SAAR of 11.9 million in March due to market disruptions caused by the COVID-19 crisis

Published on March 26, 2020

The car shopping experts at Edmunds say that March will be a down month for the auto industry due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, forecasting that 1,044,805 new cars and trucks will be sold in the U.S. for an estimated seasonally adjusted annual rate (SAAR) of 11.9 million. This reflects a 35.5% decrease in sales from March 2019 and a 23.4% decrease from February 2019.

Edmunds experts note that the downturn in March will also lead to a drop in quarterly sales, forecasting that 3,546,415 new cars and trucks will be sold in the first quarter of 2020, which reflects an 11.8% decrease from the first quarter of 2019.

“The first two months of the year started off at a healthy sales pace, but the market took a dramatic turn in mid-March as more cities and states began to implement stay-at-home policies due to the coronavirus crisis, and consumers understandably shifted their focus to other things,” said Jessica Caldwell, Edmunds’ executive director of insights. “The whole world is turned upside down right now, and the auto industry is unfortunately not immune to the wide-ranging economic impacts of this unprecedented pandemic.”

Edmunds analysts note that the nationwide shutdown of auto manufacturing facilities and limited inventory mean that automakers aren’t currently pressured to offer attractive incentives on new vehicles, but that will likely change as the COVID-19 crisis continues to evolve.

“Automakers can count on capturing some deferred demand once we get past the worst of this pandemic, but since they’ll be competing with so many other companies for consumer spending at that point, they’re really going to need to create incentives to spur some sales,” said Caldwell. “Things might look a bit bleak as automakers are taking a hit right now across the board, but the massive stimulus package deal that was just announced is an encouraging update. History has shown us that this industry can survive through almost any financial or natural disaster, and we’re confident that they’re going to come out of this tough period on the other side.”

Q1 SALES VOLUME FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER

SALES
VOLUME

2020 Q1
Forecast

Q1 2019

Q4 2019

Change from
Q1 2019

Change from Q4
2019

GM

637,104

665,840

735,909

-4.3%

-13.4%

Ford

506,772

590,249

601,862

-14.1%

-15.8%

Toyota

497,111

543,714

604,016

-8.6%

-17.7%

FCA

463,277

498,425

542,519

-7.1%

-14.6%

Honda

308,010

369,787

401,961

-16.7%

-23.4%

Hyundai/Kia

272,569

288,384

340,482

-5.5%

-19.9%

Nissan

261,615

365,851

301,291

-28.5%

-13.2%

VW/Audi

118,952

133,987

150,807

-11.2%

-21.1%

Industry

3,546,415

4,021,986

4,291,309

-11.8%

-17.4%

Q1 MARKET SHARE FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER

Market
Share

2020 Q1
Forecast

Q1 2019

Q4 2019

Change from
Q1 2019

Change from
Q4 2019

GM

18.0%

16.6%

17.1%

8.5%

4.8%

Ford

14.3%

14.7%

14.0%

-2.5%

2.0%

Toyota

14.0%

13.5%

14.1%

3.6%

-0.5%

FCA

13.1%

12.4%

12.6%

5.5%

3.4%

Honda

8.7%

9.2%

9.4%

-5.6%

-7.3%

Hyundai/Kia

7.7%

7.2%

7.9%

7.2%

-3.1%

Nissan

7.4%

9.1%

7.0%

-18.8%

5.2%

VW/Audi

3.4%

3.3%

3.5%

0.6%

-4.6%

MARCH 2020 SALES VOLUME FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER

Sales
Volume

2020 March
Forecast

March 2019

February 2020

Change from March 2019

Change from February 2020

GM

186,428

271,517

239,426

-31.3%

-22.1%

Ford

159,957

231,680

190,255

-31.0%

-15.9%

FCA

144,102

200,307

183,509

-28.1%

-21.5%

Toyota

137,094

214,945

194,152

-36.2%

-29.4%

Honda

86,379

148,509

120,006

-41.8%

-28.0%

Nissan

82,168

150,768

99,635

-45.5%

-17.5%

Hyundai/Kia

81,294

118,442

106,777

-31.4%

-23.9%

VW/Audi

33,621

57,394

44,833

-41.4%

-25.0%

Industry

1,044,805

1,620,183

1,364,199

-35.5%

-23.4%

*NOTE: March 2020 had 25 selling days, March 2019 had 27 and February 2020 had 26.

Edmunds estimates that retail SAAR will come in at 8.8 million vehicles in March, with fleet transactions accounting for 26.3% of total sales.

MARCH 2020 MARKET SHARE FORECAST, BY MANUFACTURER

Market
Share

2020 March
Forecast

March 2019

February 2020

Change from March 2019

Change from February 2020

GM

17.8%

16.8%

17.6%

6.5%

1.7%

Ford

15.3%

14.3%

13.9%

7.1%

9.8%

FCA

13.8%

12.4%

13.5%

11.6%

2.6%

Toyota

13.1%

13.3%

14.2%

-1.1%

-7.8%

Honda

8.3%

9.2%

8.8%

-9.8%

-6.0%

Nissan

7.9%

9.3%

7.3%

-15.5%

7.7%

Hyundai/Kia

7.8%

7.3%

7.8%

6.5%

-0.6%

VW/Audi

3.2%

3.5%

3.3%

-9.1%

-2.1%

More insight into recent auto industry trends can be found in the Edmunds Industry Center at edmunds.com/industry-center.

Finance Reporter