September Auto Sales Should Bring Highest SAAR Since April
I have long said that a key number for Sirius XM is 1 million cars sold per month. Vehicle sales at this level allow the company to announce decent numbers across the board in the company’s quarterly conference calls. It takes sales of over 1.15 million per month for the company to demonstrate growth beyoud what we have experienced over the past year in terms of the financial metrics.
In most cases we should see decent headlines when vehicle sales are announced. GM is anticipated to have year over year growth of 20% as is Chrysler. Ford, which had more stability in sales last year is anticipated to announce that they beat September 2010 by somewhere between 6% and 10%. Meanwhile Toyota and Honda are announcing that they have returned to normalized production rates, and Hyundai/Kia is pushing a lot more metal this year as they have gained market share.
After a substantial drop in stock price for Sirius XM, good auto sector news is badly needed. Naturally there will be some hesitance on the street because of the UAW and the potential for a work stoppage at Ford, but realistically most feel that a deal will be reached. It has been rumored that Ford is looking to add as many as 10,000 jobs, something which the union wants.
Position – Long Sirius XM Satellite Radio
Nice dissemination Spencer! The shorts will start to cover soon.
This suggests sales will be even better in October – if we can get the talking heads to stop trying to scare everyone.
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http://news.yahoo.com/us-auto-.....59936.html
A shortage of cars is another reason truck and SUV sales were strong. Analysts had expected more Japanese cars to fill showrooms after months of shortages related to March’s earthquake and tsunami.
But Honda and Toyota continued to struggle with product shortages. Toyota’s September sales were down 17.5 percent, while Honda’s fell 8 percent.
Truckloads of new Honda vehicles arrived at dealerships last week, and Toyota Motor Corp.’s new Camry sedan recently went on sale, but they were too late in both cases to give September totals a significant boost.
Bob Carter, Toyota’s U.S. sales chief, said October should be a turning point. With all of its plants now running, the automaker expects its Toyota division to post its first year-over-year sales increase since April and it expects to post sales increases through the fourth quarter and beyond.
Many buyers were replacing trucks in September because they had to. The average truck on the road is now around 10.1 years old, according to R.L. Polk and Associates.