The growth of digital adoption in the auto finance sector improved by 32% in the fourth quarter compared with the prior-year quarter — despite a 2% decrease from Q3 — according to Wolters Kluwer, home of the Digital Transformation Index.

The news follows a significantly more modest gain in Wolters Kluwer’s Q3 report, which found adoption slowed on a quarter-over-quarter basis but promised the index would show improvement at year’s end.

“Auto dealers, service providers, and lenders closed out the year by putting the pedal to the metal on the adoption of digitized contracting,” analysts wrote, in part, in the latest report. “Although the fourth-quarter adoption rate was down slightly (2 percent) compared to Q3, the overall trends underscore that auto retailers and their lender partners continue to recognize the value in adopting eContracting workflows to increase back-office efficiency.”

Read the full report at Wolters Kluwer