Autobytel.com Hits Cancel Button

Irvine-based Autobytel.com Inc., the online automobile-buyer referral service, said Tuesday it has called off its $17.5-million acquisition of W.G. Nichols Inc., publishers of the Chilton line of auto repair manuals.

Autobytel.com did not disclose a reason for the cancellation in its one-sentence filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. A company spokeswoman would say only that the decision came after the company had conducted due diligence.

The company had planned on using the repair manuals to boost the auto servicing section of its Web site with information on when and how to service cars.

“This does not change our strategy one iota,” said Michael Lowell, Autobytel.com’s senior vice president of development. “We’re still moving forward and still getting the content out, and it does not set us back at all.”

The deal had called for Autobytel.com to pay $13 million in cash and 253,923 shares of stock worth $4.5 million at the time the deal was announced in late July.

Since then, Autobytel.com’s stock has lost nearly a third of its value, falling from $17.75 to $11.94 at the market’s close on Tuesday. The decline lopped nearly $1.5 million off the value of the deal.

Officials at W.G. Nichols, headquartered in West Chester, Pa., could not be reached.