At this year’s Auto Intel Summit + National Remarketing Conference presented by SmartAuction in Cary, N.C.., a trio of experts discussed how digital auditing is now enabling floorplan and wholesale finance companies to “self-audit” physical auto and equipment inventory, leveraging artificial intelligence, machine learning and API integration. This week, NextGear Capital rolled out that kind […] [Read More]

If you were playing an eating or drinking game based on the number of times policymakers and experts referenced inflation on Wednesday in connection with interest rates holding steady, you would likely have a full belly or an upcoming hangover quite quickly. The Federal Reserve’s Federal Open Market Committee voted unanimously to keep the federal […] [Read More]

When looking at the data on a year-over-year basis, the climb in bankruptcy filings by both consumers and businesses remain upward and notable. According to data provided by Epiq AACER, there were 44,980 total U.S. bankruptcy filings in May, representing a 16% increase from last May’s total of 38,696. Experts determined noncommercial bankruptcy filings registered […] [Read More]

Artificial intelligence seems to be spreading into everything these days. So why not vehicle history reports? Vehicle history report platform Bumper.com’s answer to that question is a new feature called Smart Insights, designed to use generative AI to “analyze and distill” the most important information in a history report. The company said Smart Insights is […] [Read More]

The heartland is in a sweet spot for electric vehicle adoption in some ways, but EV ownership is low in most states in the middle of the U.S. Price is one issue, said panelists at the “What’s it going to take to drive EV adoption in the heartland?” session at the Electrify Expo Industry Day conference in Long Beach in southern California in late May. But other factors play a role, and dealers need to ... [Read More]

Digital auditing is now enabling floorplan and wholesale finance companies to “self-audit” physical auto and equipment inventory, leveraging artificial intelligence, machine learning and API integration. At this year’s Auto Intel Summit + National Remarketing Conference presented by SmartAuction in Cary, N.C.., Marguerite Watanabe of Connections Insights moderated a panel discussion about how these digital audits […] [Read More]

At the beginning of May, new-vehicle inventory was estimated at 2.84 million, which was 51% higher year-over-year and at the highest point since late 2020, according to vAuto Live Market View. And Black Book is saying that automakers are sending more volume to the wholesale market, too, even as analysts saw an accelerated depreciation rate […] [Read More]

Orbee and ActivEngage are working together to help dealerships. This week, the provider of customer experience middleware for the automotive industry said it has integrated with the automotive chat and text communications platform. Orbee and ActivEngage highlighted their integration allows for the data from a shopper’s interaction through the ActivEngage platform to be unified with […] [Read More]

Last year, ZT Automotive, the automotive portfolio entity of ZT Corporate, announced a strategy to “transform” the dealership group to create “deeper alignment across its dealerships that drives operational efficiencies and an enhanced customer journey.” In the first half of 2024, the company has taken a big step toward that transformation with the addition of […] [Read More]

In the face of uncertainty in the automotive market, the American economy in general and the nation’s political future, the outlook of car dealers remains remarkably steady, according to the latest Cox Automotive Dealer Sentiment Index. Of course, that’s not necessarily a good thing. The index for the second quarter of 2024 was virtually unchanged […] [Read More]