North American auto plants are holding firm on their production schedules this week, but the microchip shortage is still hovering over the year.

Automakers will cut 68,000 more vehicles out of their worldwide factory schedules this week because of the microchip shortage, according to the latest estimate from AutoForecast Solutions.

North American plants expect no cuts, for a change. Most of the latest disruption is occurring in Europe and at Asian assembly plants outside China.

While more modest than many other production schedule modifications this year, the latest cuts bring the global industry to a loss of nearly 4.2 million cars and trucks in 2022 to date, according to AutoForecast Solutions. 

Automakers have been inching back to more normal supplies of chips all year, but they still have a long way to go. AutoForecast now warns that 200,000 more vehicles likely will be eliminated this month because of insufficient chip supplies. But its projection for the end-of-year total has been trimmed back by nearly 92,000 vehicles from the full-year forecast just one week ago.