Report: Cash for Clunkers Boosts August Auto Sales
The U.S. auto industry showed continued improvement in the month of August, helped on by the Obama Administration’s Cash for Clunkers program.
Ford was once again a big winner as sales increased 17.2 percent over last August, a significant improvement over the 2.4 percent growth in July – which was thought to be good at the time.
Honda posted a 9.9 percent increase while Toyota pulled itself from the gutters with a 6.4 percent gain.
Unfortunately for GM and Chrysler, the turnaround seems to have left them behind, with GM slipping 20.1 percent and Chrysler dropping 15.4 percent. Both of those numbers are worse than in July, with GM dropping 19.4 percent and Chrysler dropping 9.4 percent then.
Two smaller players in the U.S. market that are now poised to become larger players are Hyundai and Subaru. Hyundai saw an increase of 47 percent, while Subaru posted 51.5 percent growth. Volkswagen also posted growth of 11.4 percent.
Current estimates now put the total number of vehicle sales for 2009 at the 14.4 million mark, a significant increase from the sub-10 million units forecasted during the height of the recession.
[Source: Automotive News]
See the full U.S. Auto Industry August Sales Results after the jump:
| Automaker | Aug. 2009 | Aug. 2008 | Pct. chng. | 8 month 2009 | 8 month 2008 | Pct. chng. |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| BMW Group* | 24,373 | 30,968 | –21.3% | 160,284 | 218,117 | –26.5% |
| Chrysler Group LLC | 93,222 | 110,235 | –15.4% | 653,319 | 1,076,170 | –39.3% |
| Daimler AG** | 18,749 | 20,945 | –10.5% | 130,155 | 175,051 | –25.6% |
| Ford Motor Co.*** | 181,826 | 155,117 | 17.2% | 1,119,863 | 1,488,628 | –24.8% |
| General Motors**** | 245,550 | 307,285 | –20.1% | 1,381,224 | 2,129,860 | –35.1% |
| Honda (American)† | 161,439 | 146,855 | 9.9% | 806,907 | 1,083,957 | –25.6% |
| Hyundai Group†† | – | – | –% | – | – | –% |
| Isuzu | – | 289 | – | 165 | 3,931 | –95.8% |
| Jaguar Land Rover††† | 3,160 | 3,321 | –4.8% | 23,953 | 10,357 | 131.3% |
| Maserati | 127 | 182 | –30.2% | 818 | 1,729 | –52.7% |
| Mazda | 26,542 | 23,680 | 12.1% | 145,955 | 199,239 | –26.7% |
| Mitsubishi | 6,813 | 9,200 | –25.9% | 38,127 | 72,727 | –47.6% |
| Nissan‡ | 105,312 | 108,493 | –2.9% | 524,903 | 726,134 | –27.7% |
| Porsche | 1,526 | 1,404 | 8.7% | 12,729 | 19,618 | –35.1% |
| Subaru | 28,683 | 18,932 | 51.5% | 143,828 | 129,298 | 11.2% |
| Suzuki | 5,749 | 6,083 | –5.5% | 31,793 | 70,434 | –54.9% |
| Toyota‡‡ | 225,088 | 211,533 | 6.4% | 1,170,407 | 1,649,044 | –29.0% |
| VW‡‡‡ | – | – | –% | – | – | –% |
| Other (estimate) | 384 | 524 | –26.7% | 3,075 | 4,185 | –26.5% |
| TOTAL | 1,128,543 | 1,155,046 | –2.3% | 6,347,505 | 9,058,479 | –29.9% |