CLEVELAND — While it's been more than a week now that the industry has digested the fact that June new-vehicle retail sales numbers dipped from the previous month, the senior automotive analyst KeyBanc Capital Markets called it "a sigh of relief."

The reason why Brett Hoselton made this proclamation was because the performance left the June SAAR level in line with industry expectations. Turns out, the sales output placed the SAAR mark at 11.1 million.

"Street expectations were generally for a low 11 million unit SAAR, however, following weaker economic data over the past month and a bearish report from J.D. Power, some were likely anticipating the SAAR to fall toward the high 10 million level," Hoselton explained.

Going forward, Hoselton believes that the light-vehicle SAAR might be somewhat resilient to uneven economic data. He spelled out three reasons:

—The SAAR rate is still below the average scrappage rate of 12.4 million units.

—Automakers could still increase incentives, which remain relatively low.

—The previous decline in SAAR to lows at the 9 million unit level was driven in part by limited availability of financing and leasing, both of which Hoselton contends have improved significantly.

Hoselton wrapped up his discussion by stating, "We are unlikely to see the headline risk of a bankruptcy of a U.S. automaker like we saw during the previous decline."