Despite a strong spring market for used vehicles in 2002, the wholesale used-vehicle prices will continue to face downward pressure in the remainder of 2002 from new-vehicle incentives and high off-lease volumes, according to the spring edition of ADESA Corp.’s Pulse report. The ADESA Auction Dealer Optimism Index mirrored the recovery in wholesale prices, con-firming that conversion rates (vehicles sold as a percentage of vehicles offered at auction) had also recovered as a result of the early and unusually strong spring market. The ADESA index, which measures the year-on-year percentage point change in dealer consignment conversion rates, recovered from a 9.1 percentage point drop in October to a 4.0 percentage point jump in February before tapering to a 2.6 percentage point up-tick in April. According to Tom Kontos, vice president, industry relations and analytical services for ADESA and author of Pulse, “In the winter edition of Pulse we recommended that dealers capitalize on the then-ample supplies and low prices of late-model vehicles in time for the spring market, and it looks like savvy dealers did just that.”