General Motors Corp and other US automakers may continue to lose ground in their home market this year as Japanese rivals including Nissan Motor Co boost light-truck sales and European companies such as Bayerische Motoren Werke AG win more affluent buyers.
With slow sales at home, overseas rivals are stepping up efforts to win US customers from General Motors, Ford Motor Co and DaimlerChrysler AG's Chrysler unit. That adds to pressure in the world's biggest market, where analysts forecast a third consecutive drop in annual sales.
The Japanese and Europeans will display their latest push into the US makers' mainstay light trucks at the annual Detroit auto show, which begins today. Nissan is introducing its first full-size pickup, a rival for Ford's redesigned F-150. Toyota Motor Corp will show a revamped Sienna minivan, and BMW and Porsche AG will introduce new sport-utility vehicles.
US-based automakers "continue to lose market share, particularly to the Japanese," said Lynn Yturri, a fund manager at Banc One Investment Advisors, which owns 100,000 GM preferred shares and last month sold its 100,000 Ford shares. "That's a long-term trend and one of the reasons we're not optimistic about the auto industry."
The combined US share of GM, Ford and Chrysler slid to 61.7 percent last year from 63.3 percent in 2001. That's down from 72.9 percent in 1996, according to Autodata Corp, which tracks sales.
US automakers' stock prices fell last year. Ford dropped 41 percent, DaimlerChrysler 26 percent and General Motors 24 percent.
Nissan's shares in Japan rose 33 percent, while Toyota declined 3.9 percent. Porsche fell 7.2 percent.
Yield spreads over US Treasury bonds for benchmark 10-year bonds sold by General Motors, Ford and DaimlerChrysler widened an average 74 basis points in the past six months as investors saw the bonds as riskier investments because of a declining sales outlook and rising pension deficits.
Japanese automakers, helped by new trucks such as Honda's Pilot sport-utility, widened their US share to 27.5 percent in 2002 from 26.7 percent. Toyota, Honda Motor Co and Nissan get as much as 90 percent of their operating profit from North America and expect record earnings for their fiscal year ending in March.
"How the Japanese automakers perform in North America has a lot to do with the direction of their earnings," said Norihiko Kamada, who helps manage US$1.2 billion, including auto shares, at Chuo Mitsui Asset Management Co.
The Japanese are winning US customers by offering cars that consumers judge to have higher quality for the price, analysts said. Honda's Accord has a starting price of about US$15,600 compared with US$18,750 for the Ford Taurus.
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