UAW Strike Helping Wholesale Auction Results

Wholesale auto auction values have been in consistent decline since May. But recent improvements in auction results are emerging. But possibly at the cost of new car production.

Wholesale Prices, Week Ending September 30th

As the UAW strike continues on, the market has settled into a period of stability when it comes to pricing trends. However, buyer interest has been up at auctions with the conversion rates continuing to climb each week.

UAW Strike Helping Wholesale Auction Results

Car Segments

On a volume-weighted basis, the overall Car segment decreased -0.15%. For reference, in the previous week, cars decreased by -0.29%.
The 0-to-2-year-old Car segments were down -0.03% and 8-to-16-year-old Cars declined -0.09%.
Seven of the nine Car segments decreased last week.
Sub-Compact (+0.04%) and Compact (+0.02%) Car segments increased last week, compared to the prior week’s decline of -0.48% and -0.35%, respectively. Prior to last week’s increase, the Compact Car segment had been declining consistently for the previous eighteen weeks, for an average weekly change of -0.94%.
Prestige Luxury Car had the largest decline last week, down -0.44%, compared to the prior week’s decline of -0.25%.

Truck / SUV Segments

The volume-weighted, overall Truck segment decreased -0.05%, which is much less than the depreciation seen the prior week, of –0.19%.
The 0-to-2-year-old models were stable with a 0.00% average change last week, while the 8-to-16-year-olds declined -0.25%.
Three of the thirteen Truck segments increased last week, with Small Pickup reporting the largest increase at +0.26%, followed by Mid-Size Crossover (+0.19%) and Compact Crossover (+0.09%). The Mid-Size Crossover segment also increased +0.08% the week prior.
Compact Van had the largest decline, with a drop of -1.28%. The segment has been declining for twenty-five consecutive weeks with an average weekly decline of -0.62%.

Weekly Wholesale Index

The graph below looks at trends in wholesale prices of 2 to 6-year-old vehicles, indexed to the first week of the year. The index is computed keeping the average age of the mix constant to identify market movements.

Wholesale

We are now moving into the third week of the United Auto Worker (UAW) strike, and now roughly 25,000 UAW union members are actively striking, with more plants being affected in Chicago and Lansing, Michigan since the strike began. As a result, the wholesale market is starting to show signs of improvement, with demand increasing at auction, as many are expecting supply disruptions to come later. Again, last week, we saw two car segments with positive movement, including Compact Car and Sub-Compact Car, and on the truck side three segments had positive movement, including Compact Crossover/SUV, Mid-Size Crossover/SUV, and Small Pickups. All but one of these segments (Mid-Size Crossover) showed a decline the week prior.