US auto sales projected to slump in June due to disruption from CDK outage

Sales of new vehicles in the U.S. are expected to be down this month compared to June 2023 due to the outage at software provider CDK Global that has affected dealerships across the country, according to a new report.

A joint forecast released Wednesday by J.D. Power and GlobalData said total new-vehicle sales in June are expected to land between 1,336,800 and 1,273,600 units, a 2.6% to 7.2% decrease from the same month a year ago.

The analysts pointed to the outages, which have caused some dealerships to return to conducting business using manual paperwork and others to even temporarily shut down operations, were a driving factor behind the projected decline.

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“Because of the disruption to dealer software systems, June sales will not be reflective of actual consumer demand for new vehicles,” said Thomas King, president of the data and analytics division at J.D. Power. “Instead, a significant number of sales that would have occurred in June are now likely to occur in July.”

New-vehicle sales in the U.S. are expected to be down for June due to thousands of dealerships being offline for more than a week, but sales are expected to pick back up once operations fully resume. (David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images)

“However,” King said, “it should be noted that a significant range of sales outcomes are possible due to the uncertainty about exactly when system outages will be resolved and what countermeasures dealers put in place to transact sales through the close.”

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CDK, which provides software to more than 15,000 retailer dealer locations across North America, reported being hit by two cyberincidents last week. Many of the company’s customers have been unable to fully operate since the firm took its systems offline on June 19..

Cyberattacks on software company CDK Global left thousands of auto dealers in the U.S. unable to fully operate for more than a week. (Igor Golovniov/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

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In its latest update to dealerships on Tuesday, CDK said it does not expect to have all customers fully operational before Sunday.

FOX Business’ Aislynn Murphy contributed to this report.