Sales of U.S. Cars Off 15% in Early April

Sales of new domestic cars, which have been weak since January, dipped 15% in early April, the eight U.S. auto manufacturers reported Tuesday.

The sales volume totaled 193,139 from April 1 through April 10, down from 227,304 in same nine-day selling period last year.

Existing sales incentives “don’t seem to be strong enough to get customers back into the showrooms,” said Harvey Heinbach, an auto analyst with Merrill Lynch.

Heinbach said the market is soft because many consumers bought their cars at the end of 1986, rushing to beat changes in the tax law, which took effect in January. Heinbach predicted that auto makers will sweeten incentives to draw customers back.

Among the Big Three auto manufacturers, General Motors remained the leader, even though its market share continued to decline. Of the domestic-built autos sold in the United States, GM had a market share of 51.1% in early April, down from 57% a year earlier. By contrast, Ford’s share continued to rise, climbing to 29.8% from 26% a year ago. Chrysler’s share inched up to 13.9% from 13.4% in 1986.

Ford sold 57,503 U.S.-built cars, versus 58,973 in the same period last year. GM sold 98,792 autos domestically, down from 129,506, and Chrysler’s sales totaled 26,901, down from 30,511.

On a seasonally adjusted basis, new cars sold at a rate of 6.8 million units, down from 7.9 million in the 1986 period. The rate reflects the number of cars that would be sold if the period’s sales pace continued for a full year.

Thomas O’Grady, an analyst with Integrated Automotive Resources, a research firm based in Wayne, Pa., said it is difficult to interpret the early April results. He said the statistics are skewed by auto companies that time their sales reports so as to boost the figures in certain periods. But O’Grady added that sales may be soft because of “disarray and turmoil” in the economy, “with interest rates going up and the stock market going down so much.”

Results were mixed among other auto manufacturers. Honda and Nissan increased their sales of cars built in the United States by 58.3% and 45.0%, respectively. American Motors’ sales slipped 55.3%, while Volkswagen’s sales of U.S.-built cars were off 41.1%.