(February 16, 2011) SANTA MONICA, Calif. — Recent proclamations that a "price war" is brewing between automakers appear to be premature, according to an analysis of incentives trends published on Edmunds' AutoObserver.com.

In "Back to the Barracks on Incentives," AutoObserver's Dale Buss reports that General Motors paid $3,733 in True Cost of Incentives (TCISM), on average, for each 2011 model year vehicle sold in January — a 22 percent increase over its TCIsm average in December 2010.

The automaker's incentive boost was a major departure from typical January car deals and no other major automaker came within even half of GM's incentives increase.

"It takes at least two sides to battle, and besides a reluctant Toyota, no other major automaker has joined GM's unseasonably proactive incentivizing," said Buss. "With a recovery gradually building in the U.S. market, most car companies don't see a need to deliver more incentives."

According to analysis by Edmunds.com, GM's feisty incentives spending paved the way for the first overall December-to-January TCISM increase in the auto industry in at least the last 10 years. Historically, January sales are the lowest of any month in the U.S. market, and automakers typically use the month as a breather between feverish Christmas-holiday promotions and the spring selling season that often begins with Presidents' Day initiatives in February.

Edmunds.com analysts speculate that GM's aggressive incentives spending is more of a short-term play to increase market share than an attempt to drive a "price war" with competitors.

"GM's increase in incentives could be an attempt to draw out what industry observers have predicted for a while now: a period of pent-up demand accumulated during the recession that should result in a better sellers' market," said Edmunds.com's Chief Economist Lacey Plache. "They may be thinking that consumer spirits are up now, and there are signs of credit loosening, so they're seeing if they can pull some people out of the woodwork who may be ripe for buying."

Edmunds' AutoObserver.com, however, doesn't anticipate that GM's incentives play will bait competitors into similar behavior.

"Most big players in the American market," writes Buss, "aren't likely to abandon their hard-won discipline of tighter inventories, firmer pricing and more attention to brand-building in order to chase expensive and probably ephemeral upticks in market share with expensive incentives."