by Calculated Risk on 6/01/2017 04:00:00 PM

Based on a preliminary estimate from WardsAuto, light vehicle sales were at a 16.60 million SAAR in May.

That is down 3% from May 2016, and up 1% from last month.


Click on graph for larger image.

This graph shows the historical light vehicle sales from the BEA (blue) and an estimate for May (red, light vehicle sales of 16.60 million SAAR mostly from WardsAuto).

This was below the consensus forecast of 16.9 million for May.

After two consecutive years of record sales, it looks like sales will be down in 2017.

The second graph shows light vehicle sales since the BEA started keeping data in 1967.

Note: dashed line is current estimated sales rate.