Ahead of the Tape
Breaking the Glass for Automobile Sales</br></br>Call it the parable of the broken windshield.</br></br>Besides housing and infrastructure, one of the biggest artificial boosts to gross domestic product from superstorm Sandy will come from the auto industry. When November figures are reported this week, the devastation may translate into the best month for light-vehicle sales since the financial crisis. Though the storm only affected the end of October, Edmunds.com notes that 30% of sales typically occur during those days. It estimates some 30,000 sales were deferred, equivalent to 400,000 at a seasonally adjusted annualized rate.</br></br>Then there is the effect of destroyed or damaged vehicles. The National Crime Insurance Bureau estimates 230,000 cars were damaged by Sandy, with 83% in New York or New Jersey.</br></br>Estimates for November's seasonally adjusted annual rate of light-vehicle sales are as high as 15.27 million, nearly one million higher than in October. That would have been nothing special before the crisis, when they averaged nearly 17 million, but it now makes the U.S. look like one of the hottest car markets world-wide.