Sometimes bad news is also good news, and this was the case in the US automobile industry in June.
Unless your name is Honda or Hyundai, June was awful. US auto sales fell to their lowest level in 15 years. And for once, Toyota saw a bigger decline than GM.
It seemed as if Toyota’s march towards the number one slot in the US automobile industry was inevitable, but last month its sales fell by 21 per cent. By contrast, GM suffered only an 18.5 per cent drop. Mind you, that was largely down to a massive clearance sale at GM; shares in the company recently fell to a 33 year low.
Mind you, right now, Ford and Chrysler would probably give their eye-teeth for sales figures like Toyota’s. They saw sales fall 28 and 36 per cent respectively.
Honda, on the other hand, saw sales of the Civic and Accord soar. In all, sales at Honda US were up 1.1 per cent, and for the second month in a row enjoyed more sales than Chrysler, making the company the US number 4.
Hyundai saw a 1.3 per cent rise.
A part of Toyota’s problem has been lack of supply; this was particularly a problem with its hybrid car, the Prius, so, presumably, this problem will get fixed.
The US accounts for around 25 per cent of global consumption of oil. Sure, China is seeing oil consumption grow faster, but it remains a minnow compared to the US. And the terrible state of the US car industry shows that Americans are feeling the oil pinch. They will buy more fuel efficient cars from the likes of Honda and Hyundai.
US demand for oil will, as a result, fall. And this will be a major factor in pushing down on global oil demand over the next few years, and is one of several reasons why we reckon oil will fall back to below $100, eventually.
Comments
Trackbacks