Most automakers post year-over-year decline in December - the weakest for full-year sales since 1998; U.S.-based automakers continue to lose ground to imports.
Automakers posted lower sales in December, closing out a difficult year that likely brought the worst performances of the decade in the face of higher gasoline prices and declining home values.
Industrywide sales were off nearly 3 percent in the month from the year-earlier period, although they rebounded nearly 18 percent from the very weak November sales level, according to preliminary figures from sales tracker Autodata. Still even with the rebound, the full-year sales ended down 2.5 percent - at their weakest level since 1998.
As far as other trends, the traditional Big Three automakers lost ground to their overseas-based rivals, as domestic brands barely edged out import brands with 50.6 percent for the month, and 51.1 percent for the full year.
The No. 1 U.S. automaker, General Motors (GM, Fortune 500), saw its sales of cars and light trucks, such as pickups and SUVs, fall 4.4 percent in December to 319,837 vehicles. That left its full-year sales down 6 percent to 3.8 million.
Sales of GM's light trucks were nearly flat from a year earlier, helped by the sales of fuel-efficient "crossover vehicles." The automaker's traditional car models dropped 10 percent, despite a nearly 7 percent rise in sales of its newly introduced Malibu sedan, which has been met by critical acclaim and strong demand.
But GM may have lost out to rival Toyota Motor (TM) in its bid to have its Chevrolet brand become the top-selling name. Ford Motor's core Ford brand had been the best-selling
nameplate in 2006.
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