The six month trend, the research and analysis firm says, implies that fleet business conditions have softened, while the PLI “appears to be stabilizing” and remains above the “critical” value of 95.
“CMVC views 95 as an inflection point as a PLI figure below 95 implies fleet cyclical factors have weakened to levels causing fleets to make substantial changes to operations, such as the temporary idling of trucks that decrease parts aftermarket sales,” CMVC president Chris Brady says.
“Changes to fleet operations in response to weak fleet business conditions implies adjustments to truck capacity, such as temporary idling trucks, returning leased trucks prematurely, reducing truck capacity and other strategies that indirectly slow the rate of depreciation of the truck population resulting in lower parts aftermarket sales,” he adds. “A PLI figure above 95 implies truck utilization remains at relatively high levels resulting in normal depreciation of the truck population.”
The study suggests, since PLI is relatively stable and above 95, fleets are making moderate adjustments to operations to improve profitability, so vehicle demographic factors are playing a larger role in influencing parts aftermarket sales.
About the PLI: PLI was designed by CMVC to be a short-term forecasting indicator of U.S. commercial vehicle parts aftermarket sales by signaling peaks/troughs and inflection/turning points in parts sales due to changes in fleets’ business environments as a result of cyclical change in the business cycle – expansion, recession and recovery.
