Grade The Analysts: Edmund's Caldwell Beats Bankers, Truecar

by Bertel Schmitt

Published: November 1st, 2011

grade the analysts edmund s caldwell beats bankers truecar

US Car sales are up a solid 10 percent in October, and Automotive News [sub] has the October Seasonally Adjusted Annual Rate (SAAR) at 13.26 million. I need to hop on a plane to Tokyo, so I go with this number for the time being. 13.26 is pretty much the average of our analyst guesses. As for the Detroit 3, General Motors disappointed at 2 percent (and threw the analysts off), Ford and Chrysler came in as expected at 6 and 27 percent respectively. And how did our analysts fare?

The sharpest crystal ball was in the hands of Jessica Caldwell of Edmunds. She came closest to the Detroit 3, and pretty close to the SAAR. Our last month winner Road Lache of Deutsche Bank takes second, followed by Jesse Toprak of TrueCar. Peter Nesvold of Jefferies and Adam Jones of Morgan Stanley came closest to the SAAR, but having supplied no Detroit 3 numbers, they were penalized. If you want to win in this game, you need to guess what Detroit does. Thems the rules.

RankAnalyst GMFord Chrysler SAARSAAR DiffOEM DiffOverall1Jessica Caldwell (Edmunds.com)6.9%8.0%27.0%13.41.06%6.90%7.96%2Rod Lache (Deutsche Bank)5.5%4.1%24.0%13.01.96%8.40%10.36%3Jesse Toprak (TrueCar.com)4.7%7.4%33.0%13.41.06%10.10%11.16%4Brian Johnson (Barclays)4.3%8.8%19.0%13.30.30%13.10%13.40%5Chris Ceraso (Credit Suisse)7.2%7.5%20.0%13.20.45%13.70%14.15%6Patrick Archambault (Goldman Sachs)8.7%6.5%35.0%13.20.45%15.20%15.65%7Seth Weber (RBC)9.2%8.6%36.0%13.41.06%18.80%19.86%8Peter Nesvold (Jefferies)7.1%1.8%NA13.30.30%109.30%109.60%9Adam Jonas (Morgan Stanley)NANA NA13.30.30%300.00%300.30%10Himanshu Patel (JPMorgan)NANA NA13.20.45%300.00%300.45%11Alan Baum (Baum & Associates) NANA NA13.41.06%300.00%301.06%12Itay Michaeli (Citigroup) NANA NA13.11.21%300.00%301.21%13Jeff Schuster (J.D. Power) NANA NA13.11.21%300.00%301.21%14George Magliano (IHS Automotive) NANA NA12.92.71%300.00%302.71%Average6.7%6.6%28.0%13.2Actual2.0%6.0%27.0%13.26

#BertelSchmitt #GradeTheAnalysts #October2011 #Sales

Bertel Schmitt

Bertel Schmitt comes back to journalism after taking a 35 year break in advertising and marketing. He ran and owned advertising agencies in Duesseldorf, Germany, and New York City. Volkswagen A.G. was Bertel's most important corporate account. Schmitt's advertising and marketing career touched many corners of the industry with a special focus on automotive products and services. Since 2004, he lives in Japan and China with his wife <a href="http://www.tomokoandbertel.com"> Tomoko </a>. Bertel Schmitt is a founding board member of the <a href="http://www.offshoresuperseries.com"> Offshore Super Series </a>, an American offshore powerboat racing organization. He is co-owner of the racing team Typhoon.

More by Bertel Schmitt

Comments

Join the conversation

2 comments

Vbofw on Nov 01, 2011

To be fair, Edmunds is armed with real time sales data from dealer sales. The bankers job is first to provide opinions on the automakers stocks for their customers. As a part of this, they make some educated assumptions on the SAAR. Guessing monthly sales is a part of that, but a secondary part of the job. I'm going to bet on the organization with insider info to be more accurate 10 times out of 10.

Like Reply
Tparkit on Nov 02, 2011

Carmakers should enjoy the party while it lasts. The bar is about to run out of booze. http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/americans-incomes-have-dropped-67-percent-during-recovery_607640.html

Like Reply

Recent Comments

Douglas This timeframe of Mercedes has the self-disintegrating engine wiring harness. Not just the W124, but all of them from the early 90's. Only way to properly fix it is to replace it, which I understand to be difficult to find a new one/do it/pay for. Maybe others have actual experience with doing so and can give better hope. On top of that, it's a NH car with "a little bit of rust", which means to about anyone else in the USA it is probably the rustiest W124 they have ever seen. This is probably a $3000 car on a good day.
Formula m How many Hyundai and Kia’s do not have the original engine block it left the factory with 10yrs prior?
1995 SC I will say that year 29 has been a little spendy on my car (Motor Mounts, Injectors and a Supercharger Service since it had to come off for the injectors, ABS Pump and the tool to cycle the valves to bleed the system, Front Calipers, rear pinion seal, transmission service with a new pan that has a drain, a gaggle of capacitors to fix the ride control module and a replacement amplifier for the stereo. Still needs an exhaust manifold gasket. The front end got serviced in year 28. On the plus side blank cassettes are increasingly easy to find so I have a solid collection of 90 minute playlists.
MaintenanceCosts My own experiences with, well, maintenance costs:Chevy Bolt, ownership from new to 4.5 years, ~$400*Toyota Highlander Hybrid, ownership from 3.5 to 8 years, ~$2400BMW 335i Convertible, ownership from 11.5 to 13 years, ~$1200Acura Legend, ownership from 20 to 29 years, ~$11,500***Includes a new 12V battery and a set of wiper blades. In fairness, bigger bills for coolant and tire replacement are coming in year 5.**Includes replacement of all rubber parts, rebuild of entire suspension and steering system, and conversion of car to OEM 16" wheel set, among other things
Jeff Tesla should not be allowed to call its system Full Self-Driving. Very dangerous and misleading.