During July, U.S. sales of light vehicles fell for the seventh consecutive month this year. The decline was attributed by manufactures to spillover effects from weak housing & construction activity.

The 0.4% m/m decline to an annualized selling rate of 15.5M units, according to the Autodata Corporation, was slight but it dropped sales nearly 10% below the year earlier level. The decline was to the lowest since October 2005.

Sales of imported vehicles dropped a very slight 0.2% m/m to 3.99M (-5.3% y/y), again propped up by sharp discounting. Sales of imported cars ticked up by 0.6% m/m but that was not enough to prevent an 8.6% decline versus a year ago. Sales of imported light trucks fell 1.7% m/m (+1.5% y/y).

Domestic car sales again suffered a steep decline with a hard 5.4%m/m drop (-11.2% y/y). Sales of domestic light trucks recovered a bit of the prior two month’s steep declines with a 3.3% m/m increase (-10.8% y/y).

U.S Exporters: A Rare Breed from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis is available here.