Page 32 - On The Move - Volume 18, Issue 1

Kia Promotes Bill Peffer to COO in U.S.

Kia Motors America named Bill Peffer chief operating officer and execu- Kia has been one of the best-performing brands during the coronavirus
tive vice president after serving as vice president of sales operations since July crisis. Through the first nine months of the year, U.S. sales at Kia slid 7.6 percent
2017. Peffer, 50, will lead all customer-facing functions in the U.S., Kia said in a compared with the industry average of 18 percent. Kia notched a 12 percent
statement, including sales, marketing, and service. He will report to Sean Yoon, sales gain in October and a drop of just 5 percent in November despite three
president and CEO of Kia Motors America and Kia Motors North America. The fewer selling days compared with November 2019.
appointment is effective Jan. 1. "Under Peffer's leadership as vice president of sales operations," Kia said,"
"In the most difficult of circumstances, Kia's U.S. sales have outperformed KMA is on the cusp of achieving the highest retail sales total in company history
the industry throughout 2020 under Bill's leadership," Yoon said in the state- through the development of a consistent and sustainable partnership with the
ment Thursday. "This promotion is well deserved, and with five all-new and sig- dealer network."
nificantly redesigned vehicles slated for introduction in 2021 Bill will play an Source: Automotive News
increasingly important role in the growth and maturation of the Kia brand."
Prior to his arrival at Kia in July 2017 to steer sales, Peffer had been pres-
ident and COO of New England dealership group Balise Motor Sales in West
Springfield, Mass. Before joining Balise, he had a 10-month stint as Cadillac's
head of sales after leaving Nissan Australia as CEO. He has also worked for Ford
Motor Co.
In June, Kia Motors America announced that unit president Michael Cole
was leaving the brand and taking a position as CEO for Hyundai Europe. Kia and
Hyundai share a parent company, Hyundai Motor Group. At the time of Cole's
departure, Kia said the president post would be assumed by Yoon.
Kia also said Thursday that Russell Wager has been promoted to vice presi-
dent of marketing and will report to Peffer. Wager, 55, has been director of mar-
keting operations at Kia Motors America since July 2019. Previously, he was vice
president of marketing at Mazda North American Operations.
"Russell has instilled new energy into Kia's U.S. marketing activities and
played a significant role in driving more first-time Kia shoppers to our show-
rooms," Yoon said.

TransUnion Sees Auto Loan, Lease Volume Rebounding Inventory Levels Grow
but Remain Constrained
Credit bureau TransUnion expects auto loan and lease volume to recover in first-half 2021, and a roughly
flat environment for auto finance delinquencies in the coming year. Though still low, pandemic-constrained inven-
“We’re projecting a bit of a rebound” in volume, Matt Komos, TransUnion vice president-research and tory levels in the U.S. continued to ease slightly for
consulting, says in a recent webinar. Specifically, TransUnion expects auto originations of about 6.9 million ac- most automakers last month as production gained
counts in the first quarter of 2021, up about 8% from a year ago. The second-quarter 2021 TransUnion forecast ground and sales slowed. Dealers and automakers
is 7.4 million accounts, an increase of 14.6% from the low point of 2020. Totals include loans and leases, new had 2.87 million unsold vehicles on hand to open
and used. December, according to data compiled by Cox Au-
However, TransUnion isn’t making its usual precise forecast for auto delinquencies for this time of year, tomotive. The figure represents a 200,000-vehicle
because of the economic uncertainty from the ongoing effects of the coronavirus. gain from the beginning of November but is still
“We’ve seen improvement from the dark days of April, but we’re still seeing high unemployment,” Dan 690,000 vehicles lower than where inventory levels
Simmons, director of research and consulting, says in the webinar. “We may be looking at more stimulus were a year earlier.
coming up, but that remains to be seen.” It’s also unclear how fast the new coronavirus vaccine reaches a Cox estimates the industry has a 75-day supply
significant portion of the population, he says. of vehicles on hand, up from 65 days a month ago.
Adding to the uncertainty, Komos points out that different categories of debt interact with each other in Cox uses the daily sales rate from the most recent
the same household. For example, he says 1.8% of consumers with auto debt have a mortgage that’s tempo- 30-day period for its calculation.
rarily in “forbearance” status until April and May because of the pandemic. “How are those consumers going December is one of the biggest selling months
to perform when the forbearance for their mortgage ends?” he asks. “We are definitely going to have some of the year, and the industry historically has gone
pressure on delinquencies.” into the month with a large number of vehicles in
Having said that, Komos says he expects auto lenders in 2021 to stick with a trend that began before inventory. Pickup inventory remains especially tight
the pandemic: cutting back on loans to customers at the across most of the industry; the top-selling Ford
riskiest end of subprime credit. “We expect things (de- F-Series had less than a two-month supply.
linquencies) to be relatively flat, after a slight uptick at Among automakers that report monthly sales
the end of this year,” he says. and inventory levels, Subaru continued to have the
A year ago, TransUnion predicted auto delinquen- industry's tightest supply of vehicles on hand at 30
cies of 60-plus days past due in the fourth quarter of days, while Toyota and Volvo each had a 40-day sup-
2020 would represent about 1.44% of outstanding ply, according to the Automotive News Data Center.
accounts, compared with 1.47% in like-2019. That Ford, Hyundai-Kia, Mazda, Toyota Motor and
may turn out to be about right, even though nobody Volvo saw their days' supply numbers decrease from
predicted the pandemic. For the third quarter of 2020, October, while Subaru and American Honda each
TransUnion says the 60-day auto loan delinquency rate saw their days' supply figures increase.
was 1.45%. Source: Automotive News
Source: WardsAuto
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