August US Auto Sales Steady With More Gains for Toyota

DETROIT, Aug 31, 2006; Reuters reported that U.S. automakers surrendered more market share in August as sales incentives and gains by Asian automakers kept overall sales steady, analysts said on Thursday, a day before car makers release monthly U.S. sales results.

The results will provide a gauge of the pressures facing the Detroit-based car makers and an indication of the strength of U.S. consumer demand in the face of higher interest rates and a slowing housing market.

Overall U.S. auto sales on a seasonally adjusted and annualized basis are expected to be near 16.8 million units.

That would be down from 17.2 million units in July but up slightly from 2005 when sales softened as sweeping discount programs from earlier in the summer ended, analysts said.

Japan's Toyota Motor Corp., which surpassed Ford Motor Co. as the No. 2 player in the U.S. market in July, is seen on track for another strong month of sales gains due to its gains in the growing market for more fuel-efficient cars.

Toyota has posted a market-leading 10-percent growth in sales through the first seven months of the year. Those gains are expected to continue in August and the remainder of 2006 because of the success of offerings like the sold-out 2007 Camry.

"The trend of Asian market share gains and domestic market share losses will continue," Standard & Poor's equity analyst Efraim Levy said. "Toyota will keep its steady rise on track."

The U.S. market share for General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and the Chrysler group -- the traditional Big Three -- slipped to 53.3 percent in August from 55.4 percent a year earlier, according to a forecast by auto tracking Web site Edmunds.com.