US crude may have ended 2014 with a 46% loss, but oil producers' pain is turning out to be the automakers' gain: Detroit's Big Three -- Ford,
Ford posted its best December sales results in nearly a decade, reporting Monday morning that it sold 220,671 vehicles in the last month of 2014. This figure marks a 1% increase over December 2013 sales and brings the company's full-year U.S. auto sales to 2,480,942 units sold (a figure that is flat compared to full-year 2013 sales).
“Fusion and Escape posted record years, and our newest products – including Mustang and Transit and Lincolns – are attracting strong customer demand,” John Felice, Ford's vice president of US marketing, sales and service, said in a statement Monday morning. “Demand for the all-new F-150 also is very high, and it now is the fastest-turning vehicle in Ford showrooms, averaging just five days on dealer lots in December.”
For the 33rd year in a row, the F-series pickup trucks were Ford's best-selling vehicles; the company also said that the Escape and Fusion posted their best full-year sales figures ever with 306,212 and 306,860 vehicles sold (respectively).
General Motors, meanwhile, reported 274,483 vehicles sold in the month of December, a 19% increase over units sold in December 2013. The company attributed its results to strong
“Everything you need to have a great month was in place: Consumers felt good about the direction of the economy, interest rates and fuel prices were low, and our dealers did a great job introducing customers to our incredible range of new and redesigned vehicles," Kurt McNeil, GM's U.S. vice president of sales operations, stated Monday morning. “Chevrolet was strong in every segment of the market, from pickups and SUVs to cars and crossovers. Buick and GMC also had strong sales across the board, and our growth far outpaced the industry average."
Added Mustafa Mohatarem, the company's chief economist: “The momentum the economy carried through 2014 accelerated in the fourth quarter. Car-buying fundamentals remain strong and we expect higher industry sales in 2015.”
GM noted that sales to individual consumers were the highest they've been in more than 6 years, driving Chevrolet, Buick and GMC retail deliveries up 25%, 28% and 29%, respectively.
Rounding out the Big Three was Chrysler, which reported 193,261 units sold in December, a 20% increase over sales reported for the prior-year period but a figure that missed the 196,500-unit analyst consensus.
“Our best December sales in a decade pushed our full-year sales over the 2-million unit threshold for our best annual sales since 2006,” Reid Bigland, Chrysler's head of US sales, said in a statement Monday morning. “Last year marked our fifth-consecutive year of annual sales growth in the U.S., and once again, we were the fastest-growing automaker in the country.”
Chrysler's sales were helped by growth from Jeep, Ram Truck and Chrysler vehicles; Chrysler brand vehicle sales grew 53%, the largest increase of any of the company's brands.
Despite these strong results, shares of all three automakers were in the red in Monday morning trading. Shares of Chrysler's parent company, Fiat SPA, are currently down 2.57%, while Ford is down 3.52% and GM is down 1.61%. While Chrysler can attribute its loss to missing the Street's sales estimate, Ford was hurt by a downgrade from Citi Research analyst Itay Michaeli. In downgrading the stock to a neutral from a buy, Michaeli noted that Citi's "analysis doesn’t turn a
Ford bull into a bear but does question the valuation premium to GM—we now believe GM will command a premium to Ford by the end of 2015."
Michaeli also said that Citi has higher conviction on GM going into 2015 on the belief that the company will earn at least $4 in earnings per share this year and that sentiment may improve as 2016 comes into view. The way he sees it, Ford also carries a greater risk from Yen exposure and GM will benefit from gas prices in the coming year.
"In 2015 automaker stocks will increasingly be distinguished by exposures to the powerful 'arm wrestle' unfolding between gas prices (good) and the Yen (bad)," he wrote. "Naturally investors will want to prefer companies that can benefit most from lower gas while avoiding those most exposed to the Yen."
