Toyata Motor reinforced the Japanese car industry's ranking as the most profitable in the world when it produced record half-year results yesterday.
The world's third-biggest carmaker eclipsed US rivals with an automotive operating margin of 10.1 per cent, making it five times as profitable as the average of the Detroit big three General Motors, Ford and Chrysler, part of the German-US group DaimlerChrysler.
The ability of Toyota and domestic competitors Nissan Motor and Honda Motor to make record profits while America's big three are struggling with restructuring plans reflects the popularity of their vehicles in the US, which has driven strong growth in sales.
American car-makers blame their loss of market share on the weakness of the yen against the dollar.
Toyota said consolidated net profit for the six months to the end of September rose 90.2 per cent against the same period last year from Y291 billion (€2.45 billion) to Y553 billion, while consolidated operating income rose 44.3 per cent from Y506.5 billion to Y730.8 billion. It said sales in the US broke through the 1 million unit mark at 1,004,241 units against 859,000 last year, while the value of sales rose 18.2 per cent compared with the same period last year to Y3,218billion.
Nissan said sales to the North American market rose 8.3 per cent in the first half to 378,000 units, while Honda reported an 11.8 per cent increase in sales to 732,000 units.
Toyota also reported an increase in sales in all three of its remaining markets. It announced an interim dividend of Y16 a share, an increase of Y3 a share against the same period last year.
