Helped by a weaker yen, Toyota Motor Corp. boosted second-quarter profit 36 percent to $3.4 billion and forecast record annual earnings of $13 billion for the fiscal year ending next March.
The Japanese automaker also announced that it was purchasing a 5.9 percent stake in Isuzu Motors Ltd., formerly one of General Motors Corp.’s partners in Japan, for $373 million. Toyota said it planned to work jointly with Isuzu on developing diesel engines and environmental technologies.
Toyota has benefited this year from a decline in the Japanese yen relative to other major currencies that has helped Japan’s largest automaker to increase exports. In the six-month period begun April 1, the first half of the Japanese fiscal year, Toyota sold 6.61 million vehicles, closing in on GM’s 6.89 million vehicle sales for the same period.
Toyota expects to sell 8.47 million vehicles for the fiscal year ending March 31, 2007.
"For the first half, Toyota posted record consolidated results across the board," Toyota Executive Vice President Mitsuo Kinoshita said in a statement.
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