Wholesale vehicle prices remain well-above year-ago levels, but April saw a continuation of month-to-month softening in values.

Black Book’s Used Vehicle Retention Index for April (185.4) was up 21.6% from a year ago, but fell 1.3% from March. This marked the third straight sequential decline in the index, which has seen the year-over-year spikes become less pronounced, as well.

After a 52.8% gain in the Black Book index during January, the past three months have seen year-over-year hikes of 45.9%, 33% and 21.6%, respectively.

Meanwhile, Cox Automotive’s Manheim Used Vehicle Value Index was at 221.2 for April, which beat year-ago levels by 14%, but prices were down 1% from the prior month, when adjusting for mix, mileage and seasonality.

Like Black Book's index, Manheim's index has now declined sequentially for three consecutive months. After starting the year at 236.3 in January, it was at 231.3 in February, 223.5 in March and 221.2 in April.

Unadjusted, however, prices were up 16.4% year-over-year and 2.9% month-over-month in April, according to the Manheim index report.

Alex Yurchenko, who is chief data science officer at Black Book, provided some additional context on how wholesale values moved throughout the month, and what may be in store as spring and summer wears on.

“In April, we saw an overall market decline of wholesale prices for 2-8-year-old vehicle segments that comprise of Black Book’s Retention Index, but by the end of the month, the trend reversed, driven mostly by cars and smaller SUV segments” Yurchenko said in a news release. “We also finally started to see the effects of high gasoline prices on consumer demand — most non-luxury, smaller vehicles of all ages increased in price during the last week of April.

“A surprising jump in consumer confidence in April (although still one of the lowest readings in a decade) and a small decline in gas prices gave some hope for improved consumer demand for used vehicles,” he said. “With the resolution of supply chain issues being pushed further into 2023, we are expecting only a moderate decline in prices during the summer months.”

Detailing the month’s progression, Cox Automotive said that Manheim Market Report values showed the strongest gains in the early weeks of April before slowing.

“Over the last four weeks, the Three-Year-Old Index increased a net 1.7%,” Cox said in the analysis. “Over the month of April, daily MMR Retention, which is the average difference in price relative to current MMR, averaged 99.0%, which meant that market prices were slightly behind MMR values.”

Cox said the daily sales conversation rate was at 58.4%. Despite this being an uptick, it is lower than usual — in April 2019, the rate was at 60.6%, the company said.

“The lower conversion rate indicates that the month saw buyers with more bargaining power for this time of year,” Cox said.