Toyota profit jumps 70pc despite sales slip
Toyota’s quarterly profit surged 70 per cent as a weaker Japanese yen and cost cuts helped offset a slight decline in vehicle sales.
Toyota’s quarterly profit surged 70 per cent as a weaker Japanese yen and cost cuts helped offset a slight decline in vehicle sales.
Toyota Motor said on Wednesday its July-September net profit rose to 438.4 billion yen (US$4.4 billion) from 257.9 billion yen a year earlier.
The Tokyo-based maker of the Prius and Camry raised its earnings forecast for the fiscal year ending March next year to 1.67 trillion yen. But it kept its sales forecast at 9.1 million vehicles, anticipating that higher than expected sales in Japan, North America and Europe will be countered by decrease in sales in Asia.
The company raised its capital spending plans by 20 billion yen to 940 billion yen.
Quarterly sales slipped to 2.24 million vehicles from 2.25 million vehicles a year earlier.
Toyota last month said its global sales for the first nine months of the year totaled 7.41 million vehicles, little changed from the previous year but outpacing General Motors to keep its lead as the world’s top-selling automaker.
GM lost the global sales throne to Toyota for the first time in 2008 but retook the crown in 2011, when Toyota’s plants were slowed by an earthquake and tsunami in northeastern Japan that damaged suppliers of parts. Toyota recovered the lead last year.
