US auto consumers tap the brakes and swerve away from small cars

CHICAGO: Major automakers announced slowing 2018 sales in the US even as the industry maintained close to its overall total from the previous year, defying expectations.

Overall, the North American auto industry maintained a healthy sales total, boosted by low unemployment and tax cuts. A total of 17.3 million vehicles were sold, about the same as in 2017, according to figures provided by the analytics firm Autodata.

However, many major carmakers struggled to match 2017 sales, signaling US consumers were pulling back, increasingly squeezed by higher interest rates and rising price tags.

Also, Americans’ love of larger, and pricier, SUVs and trucks was not enough to offset plummeting sedan and small car purchases.

“We are forecasting sales to slow further in 2019. For some automakers, the slowdown has already begun,” Cox Automotive Senior Economist Charlie Chesbrough said in a statement.

GM, the biggest of the US automakers, reported a 2.7 per cent sales dip in the fourth quarter and a 1.6 per cent decline for 2018 – despite selling more crossover SUVs.

Ford also struggled. Sales were down 8.8 per cent in December to end the year 3.5 per cent lower than 2017. It, too, sold more of its larger vehicles, including F-Series pickups.

Another industry giant, Toyota, recorded US sales declines in December and the year – 0.9 per cent and 0.3 per cent, respectively.

FCA US, Fiat Chrysler’s US subsidiary, improved its annual total by nine per cent – fruits of its new focus on larger vehicles. The company’s sales rose 14 per cent in the final month of 2018.

“This year’s performance underscores the efforts we undertook to realign our production to give US consumers more Jeep vehicles and Ram pickup trucks,” FCA US’s sales chief Reid Bigland said in a statement. — AFP