U.S. Market light vehicle sales fell 12.7% in February 2021 as a result of a difficult year-over year comparison to a pre-pandemic market, weak fleet sales, fewer selling days and terrible weather in the Southern United States, particularly in Texas which accounts for just under 10% of sales volume for the country. Those issues are temporary and retail light vehicle demand remains extremely strong. The biggest issue for the auto industry moving forward continues to be the global semiconductor chip shortage, which is forcing most automakers to throttle back production. After starting to show signs of recovery before the chip issue arose, light vehicle inventory levels have started to decline once again. As of the end of February, the U.S. Market Days' Supply had fallen to 53, from 60 at the end of January and 68 during the same period a year ago. Beyond the statistics, Motor Intelligence has confirmed the low inventory levels by speaking with hundreds of dealers and performing visual checks on increasingly empty dealer lots. This tight inventory situation is causing automakers to cut back on incentive spending. As we have been saying, there's no need to provide a high level of costly incentives on vehicles when demand remains high and dealers don't have enough product to sell. We expect the chip issue to continue to be a problem for manufacturers for the next several months. The tight inventory situation may not begin to show meaningful improvement until Q3 and may linger for the rest of 2021. As a result, look for incentive spending to remain significantly lower on a year-over-year basis for the foreseeable future. Motor Intelligence on 03/03/2021

GM’s Spring Hill Assembly plant will return to regular production on Monday instead of April 26, a week earlier than initially announced Thursday by the company. The facility builds the GMC Acadia and Cadillac XT5 and XT6 crossovers. GM also will not halt production next week of the Chevrolet Blazer at a plant in Mexico, which was announced last week due to the chip shortage... CNBC on 04/13/2021

Overall, U.S. luxury sales rose 20 percent to 547,903 cars and light trucks in the quarter, significantly outperforming the broader industry's 12 percent increase. With the premium surge, the annualized light-vehicle sales pace in March jumped to 18.1 million, according to Motor Intelligence... Automotive News on 04/12/2021

European and U.S. buyers are warming up to the idea of purchasing a battery-powered vehicle, but continue to have concerns over the price of the technology, a survey showed, underscoring the need for government subsidies to reach EV sales and environmental goals... Reuters on 04/12/2021

Automakers and analysts have been optimistic in recent weeks that the worldwide shortage of microchips would work itself out in the second half of this year. But that upbeat prediction is changing. Many are now concluding that there is no easy path out of the mess because of the cost and complexity of the semiconductor supply chain. The growing outlook: The auto industry may have to rethink how it sources chips until producers can fulfill commitments for new capacity — a process that will take years... Automotive News on 04/12/2021

The return of the Ford Bronco has been met with approval on the behalf of anyone who likes revamped, maneuverable off-road classics, and Ford has been keen to make the most of it. Which now means that we could possibly be seeing Bronco-only dealerships in the very near future. One hundred stores have already taken Ford up on the offer... Jalopnik on 04/11/2021