American Auto Sales Continue to Rebound in Q3 2023

With massive improvements in available inventory – and a strong demand despite gonzo interest rates – vehicle sales were very robust last quarter and indeed for the entire year to date. In fact, if it weren’t for Stellantis, our chart would be green across the board.

No, seriously. In the third quarter of this year, the whole of Stellantis stumbled by 1.3 percent, dragging its yearlong performance by a similar amount. Its two largest brands in this country, Ram and Jeep, were off by 3.5 and 4.2 percent, respectively last quarter. For the year they’re down 2.5 percent and 9.5 percent, numbers which are surely keeping someone in Auburn Hills up at night. And it’s not like either brand, particularly Jeep, is exactly starved for product. In fact, if Chrysler – which sells a grand total of two 2023 models, one of which departs for ’24 – hadn’t mysteriously doubled its sales in Q3, Stellantis as a whole would be down almost 10 percent.

There’s a chart below, detailing most of the brands which have seen fit to release their sales data in a timely manner. If updates are warranted, we’ll do just that.

Elsewhere, companies like Toyota and Honda posted numbers to underscore the fact they’re rebounding from supply constraints. In fact, the Toyota brand alone sold nearly as many vehicles last quarter as Toyota and Lexus did combined in the same timeframe last year. The group is up 12.2 percent overall. Estimated deliveries at Tesla are robust to this point in 2023, outstripping the likes of Subaru, Ram, and GMC.

It is important to keep in the back of our minds these excessively positive numbers are built on the back of a horrid past couple of years, akin to your author proudly saying he ran 50 percent more distance today than yesterday but conveniently forgetting to mention the weather was apocalyptically awful 24 hours ago. And so continues TTAC’s tradition of finding a dark cloud in every silver lining, right? Most will say that positive numbers are positive numbers; they’re largely right, of course.

Talking heads are looking forward to a similarly robust Q4 performance, though those expectations should be tempered with the realities of this UAW strike. If the job action continues for a spell, some brands could once more find themselves affected by a tight supply of rigs. There's that dark cloud again.

[Image: Toyota]

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