In a sign of strong recovery, Toyota has announced a $1.5 billion profit for the first quarter of 2012, more than quadruple those of the same quarter in 2011, which was a disastrous year, marred by Japan’s tsunami damage.
As the Japanese government downgraded its economic outlook on Wednesday, Toyota announced that parts shortages will force it to halt production at five of its European plants for several days over the next two months.
Toyota Motor Corp. has agreed to pay the US government a record $32.4 million (€24.7m) to settle an investigation into its handling of two mass recalls after acceleration problems caused a series of deadly crashes.
Japanese car maker Toyota's woes continue, with the world's largest auto maker on Thursday announcing that it would recall some 1.5 million cars worldwide because of a brake problem. Toyota has already faced a similar problem.
Toyota has recalled 1.13 million Corolla sedans and Matrix hatchbacks because their engines may stall, in the latest in a string of quality problems at the Japanese auto giant.
Japanese automaker Toyota said it could not rule out another mass recall on Thursday as it reported an engine fault affecting eight models of its luxury Lexus and Crown sedans.
Japan's Toyota Motor says it may be forced to halt production at a major plant in Tianjin, China on Thursday due to a labour strike and a resulting shortage of parts. Rival carmaker Honda has also been hit by a series of recent strikes in China.
Despite pulling around 10 million vehicles on safety issues, Japanese automaker Toyota defied critics in reporting an annual profit of 2.2 billion dollars which the company expects to soar 48 percent in 2010.
Japan's Toyota made light work of its recent recall crisis Monday, reporting a 26.3% global sales surge year-on-year in March. The carmaker has recalled around ten million vehicles worldwide due to a series of accelerator and brake defects.
Japanese automaker Toyota has extended its global safety recall to include the Lexus GX 460 and other models. On Monday, Toyota was levied a $16.4 million fine by the US. Toyota is facing at least 97 wrongful death lawsuits.
