Based on their current pace, full-year certified pre-owned vehicle sales are likely to see a double-digit-percentage decline from 2021 and reach their lowest annual tally in eight years. However, there were was some momentum in August, at least from a sequential standpoint.

That’s according to a Data Point report from Cox Automotive, which said there were 211,609 CPO sales last month.

The report, which is based on Cox’s analysis of Motor Intelligence data, indicates that is a 2.6% month-over-month increase and a 5.1% year-over-year decrease.

Comparing those numbers to overall used-car retail sales (i.e. those involving a dealer), Cox Automotive found that CPO performed favorably on a year-over-year basis and slower on a month-over-month basis.

Based on a same-store set of dealership data via Dealertrack, overall used-car retail sales climbed 11% month-over-month (versus the 2.6% gain for CPO) and fell 9% year-over-year (5% slide for CPO).

As it has been in the certified market for some time now, August was a mix of good and bad.

“While CPOs remain the next best alternative to new vehicles in this market, our current sales rate is, on average, 30,000 less per month than in 2019,” Chris Frey, senior manager of economic and industry insights at Cox Automotive, said in the report.

“Year-to-date CPO sales are down almost 16% through August. Currently, CPO sales are on track to finish near 2.4 million in 2022, down around 11% from last year’s 2.7 million.”

For a bit of historical perspective, the last time CPO sales were that low was 2014, when there were 2.34 million sales, based on Auto Remarketing prior reporting.

Even in 2020, there were 2.6 million.