Toyota Profit Decreased By 77%

Toyota Motor Corp.'s Largest auto manufacturer in the world, announced that profits for the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2010-2011 decreased by 77%, the lowest in the last six quarters, following the earthquake in Japan.

Toyota reported a net profit of 25.4 billion yen (314 million dollars) for the first three months of the year, the fourth quarter of fiscal year ended March 31, 2011.

Sales fell 12% to 4.640 billion yen, while disruptions to production that Toyota could be offset by General Motors and Volkswagen AG in the top global sales this year.

Natural disaster was another misfortune for President Akio Toyoda, whose first full year in office was marked by the recall of more than 10 million cars on the issue of the accelerator pedal.

Toyota said it expects production in Japan and the U.S. to begin to recover in June.

Toyota's global sales fell 12% over the same period last year, from 1.79 million cars in the first three months of 2011. The decline was caused by a decrease of 37% of demand in Japan. North American sales fell by 12% to 551,000 units, while in Asia, excluding Japan, shipments rose 23% to 345,000 cars.

The Japanese manufacturer has lost production of 300,000 cars in Japan and 100,000 in other factories of the company until the end of April.

Source: http://www.toyota.com/