April 3, 2018—U.S. auto sales appear to have made a slight overall uptick in March, amid strong consumer confidence.
Edmunds.com auto analysts projected a 3 percent increase for the industry once the final numbers are tallied, compared with a year earlier, according to a USA Today report. Cox Automotive analysts projected a 2.6 percent increase.
Although overall sales are still expected to dip in 2018, automakers appear, at the moment, to be benefiting from an industrywide transition to larger and more profitable vehicles.
Among major OEMs, Volkswagen had an especially encouraging March, with Edmunds forecasting 12.3 percent growth year over year. Toyota had the next best month, experiencing 4.9 percent growth.
While the rest of the largest automakers largely experienced slight growth year over year, Hyundai-Kia was down 7.4 percent according to Edmunds forecasts (though Cox Automotive’s forecast for that OEM was at 1.1 percent growth).
