NASHVILLE, Tenn. –

In light of July’s Automotive Shopper Intensity index — a metric said to be able to gauge how strong car sales may be in 30–45 days — it is likely that the rest of August and September will show a “flat” market, according to online shopping activity aggregator Dataium.

The Dataium ASI index during July was fairly static from June, climbing ever-so slightly.

“It seems the dog days of summer are upon us,” stated Dataium chief executive officer Eric Brown. “Continued economic uncertainty and declining consumer sentiment are reflected in automotive demand as we head into the fourth quarter.”

In light of an unstable economy and consumer confidence dropping, shopper traffic on automaker websites is dropping for several OEMs. That said, some automakers have seen a nice lift.

Chrysler, Ford, Hyundai, Infiniti and Toyota each improved their lead volumes by more than 20 percent sequentially.

And on the dealer level, dealership websites showed gains in lead and inventory search volumes during the month, according to Dataium.

Sharing some more positive news, there was an uptick in the number of inventory searches for both SUVs and light trucks, the company indicated. These segments showed strength especially in the latter part of July during the cooling off of fuel costs.

Furthermore, there is consistent improvement among the Japanese brands with demand bouncing back for these automakers amid their production recovery, Dataium pointed out.

The following is a graph illustrating the ASI provided by Dataium: