Toyota forecasts mounting losses

Automaker expects wider-than-expected annual loss as global sales slide.

TOKYO (Reuters) — Toyota Motor Corp. forecast a far bigger full-year loss than it had flagged just six weeks ago as the world’s biggest automaker struggles to cut production fast enough to match a sharp drop in global sales.

A sudden dive in demand since late last year has caught automakers around the world flat-footed, but the pain is especially pronounced at Toyota (TM), which is saddled with too much capacity after years of building new plants to keep up with demand.


Toyota started the current financial year with a bullish forecast to make 8.87 million vehicles in the 12 months to end-March. On Friday, it saw that number at 7.08 million, down by a fifth, as it put a third of its global assembly lines on a single shift.

“The sales environment has worsened dramatically in the past month and a half in the main markets of Japan, North America and Europe,” Executive Vice President Mitsuo Kinoshita told a news conference.

Reuters