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Weekly UpdatesToyota Motor reported record first-half net profit of 291.1 billion yen ($2.4 billion), up 82.4 percent, as a weaker yen helped group sales to rise 6.4 percent from the same period a year ago.
The performance of Japan's biggest automakers contrasts with America's loss-making Big Three. Honda reported a 57 percent rise in first-half operating profit to $2.59 billion. Toyota posted operating profit of $4.17 billion in the six months through Sept. 30, up 34.7 percent from $3.09 billion.
The increase of $1.07 billion at the operating level came on gains of $1.40 billion in foreign currency exchange, $905 million in cost cuts and $165 million in increased sales, together which more than offset $1.40 billion in labor, research, development and other costs. Toyota's sales rose 6.4 percent to $56.2 billion -- also a record for the April-Sept. half -- with higher income seen in Japan, North America, Europe and other markets.
Toyota sold 2.69 million vehicles worldwide, up 1.4 percent from the year-earlier period. The weaker yen compensated for slightly fewer vehicle sales in Europe in the fiscal first half. Toyota is forecasting sales of 5.85 million vehicles in the full year ending next March 31. That's up from its initial target of 5.59 million and would be higher than last year's actual sales 5.52 million vehicles.
But for the slumping Japanese market, where Toyota holds a dominant 42-percent share, it cut its parent company target for the full year to 1.82 million units from 1.89 million.
The U.S. has been Toyota's most profitable market.
General Motors, the world's biggest automaker, lost $368 million in the July- September quarter as revenue dipped half a percent. Meanwhile Ford reported $692 million in loses as third-quarter sales shriveled 9 percent.
Like the American makers and other Asian rivals, Toyota began offering zero-financing schemes to bring U.S. customers into showrooms after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
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