Industrial Production and Capacity Utilization - G.17

Federal Reserve Seasonal Factors for Auto and Light Truck Sales

The Federal Reserve Board estimates seasonal factors for new light vehicle sales and provides these factors to The Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) for use in the National Income and Product Accounts. These factors are estimated once per year using X12-ARIMA and were last estimated in summer 2012, using vehicle sales data through April 2012. The seasonal factors for months that had not yet occurred were based on projections from the X12-ARIMA program. The factors will be revised again in summer 2013.

The BEA has posted on their website the seasonal factors for light vehicle sales projected through June 2013. These factors are available for download here.

The table below shows the same seasonal factors as are available from the BEA but also extends them through December 2014. The extended projections of the seasonal factors are prone to larger revisions each year than are the seasonal factor projections for months closer to the end of the data sample. A comma-delimited text file containing the monthly seasonal factors is available for download here.

Monthly Seasonal Factors for Auto and Light Truck Sales

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