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Letter to the Editor

Hope Springs!

Well, our Collision Repair Industry Stock Report companies by and large took a little backwards step this month on Wall Street. Only three of them posted a tiny bit of improvement over their New Year’s Day marks. All the others that we track lost some ground YTD, but not a lot, thank goodness.

Only two of our automotive refinish manufacturers and one insurer did okay in February. Sherwin-Williams, with a per share stock price of just under $64 was almost three percent above its January spot, and PPG Industries inched upwards nearly two percent YTD to just over $60 per share. Travelers Insurance posted a tiny less than half a percent gain to $50.33 per share at the Dow.

Some of the drops in per share prices can probably be attributed to earnings collections, and it is still too early in the year to accurately gauge the health of the Stock Market. I am hoping that we will see some real improvement during the next couple of months. Ah, yes - Hope springs eternal - and, after all, it is just about Spring now.

The Boyd Group hit some bumps at the Toronto Exchange this month. The collision repair facility consolidator’s per share price fell almost 11 percent YTD after an extremely consistent several months of improvement. Hopefully, the company will get back on track next month.

Oddly enough, despite the blah showing on Wall Street by our industry-related stocks, the Auto Parts and Equipment Index posted a hair over an eight percent improvement YTD, nicely out-performing the Dow Jones 30 Industrial Average, which posted about a three percent drop YTD.

What does this all mean? I do not think that anyone is willing to hazard a guess just yet. I would certainly like to see a nice, slow, steady growth on Wall Street. I think that most of us are still more than a little nervous about the health of the financial/banking sector and the housing industry. On the other hand, Ford Motor Company has been releasing facts and figures that would certainly seem to indicate that at least one of the Detroit auto manufacturers is beginning to get healthy.

I am wondering what will be happening at General Motors, now that it seems that many of the dealers originally slated to lose their GM franchises will be staying open after all.

Happy Spring to all!

-Charles Baker-

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