Toyota Motor’s quarterly profit increased 9 percent as it marked its record seventh straight fiscal year of record sales amid robust demand for its fuel-efficiency model like Corolla, Camry and Lexus and gas-and-electric hybrids Prius. Toyota’s sale rose 10 percent automatically boosting its quarterly net profit to $3.67 billion.

In this period Toyota sold 2.35 million vehicles worldwide, surpassing GM, which sold 2.266 million vehicles. The Japanese carmaker, who is all set to end GM’s 76-year supremacy as the largest carmaker by sales, forecasts global sales of 9.34 million.

To pace up with the growing demand from largest car market, US Toyota is opening its eighth North American factory in Mississippi in 2010 and is also boosting capacity in China, Russia and India.

Analysts expect that Toyota and rival Honda, Japan’s second-largest automaker, seems to extend their record market shares in the U.S. this year, taking away customers from GM and Ford Motor Co. In the January-March period, Toyota’s U.S. market share rose 1.8 points to 15.6 percent and Honda gained 0.6 points to 9.1 percent, compared with a 1.1 point drop in GM and a 2.2 points decline of Ford’s shares respectively.

US automakers lose their market to Asian rivals mainly because of steep increase in the oil prices. However, despite all hindrances, GM reported a $62 million profit in the first three months of the year for a second consecutive quarter of black ink.

Image: businessweek

Source: washingtonpost 71678