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YOKOHAMA, Japan — Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn offers a grim outlook for the United States in 2008.

Vehicle sales are poised to plunge below 15 million units, he says. And sticker price increases are a question of when, not if, as steel prices soar.

"If you take May and June and try to say that's how it's going to be looking like the next months, this year is going to be way below 15 million," Ghosn said here last week after Nissan Motor Co.'s annual shareholder meeting.

"We have to be prepared for the worst."

In May, the seasonally adjusted annual selling rate was 15.1 million. In 2007, the United States posted sales of 16.2 million.

Nissan is boosting capacity for passenger cars in the United States, as drivers drop pickup trucks and SUVs in favor of more fuel-efficient offerings. The challenge is making the shift fast enough, Ghosn said.

He said climbing steel prices will bring higher sticker prices. "Nobody can escape readjusting prices," Ghosn said.

For the first five months of the year, Nissan's U.S. sales were up 0.7 percent to 446,474 vehicles. The overall market dropped 8.4 percent during the period.