Following market softness in the late third quarter and early fourth quarter of last year, medium-duty orders appear to have shown some resilience the past two months, according to ACT Research.
In January, preliminary data show Class 5-7 net orders at 18,500 units in North America, down 9 percent from December and 20 percent year over year.
“Seasonal adjustment provides an incremental bump to January’s medium-duty net orders, which rise to 18,700 units,” says Steve Tam, ACT vice president.
“This means the Class 5-7 backlog should slide by around 3,200 units, to 49,700 units, but we caution that the data never quite align month to month. The underlying build numbers are projected, so there will some variability in reported backlogs when final data is collected,” Tam says.
ACT’s complete industry data for January, including final order numbers, will be published in mid-February.
