Toyota profits soar despite chip shortage

TOKYO -ToyotaMotor reported on Wednesday that its profit more than doubled for the January-March period to 777 billion yen ($7 billion) from a year earlier, as the automaker's sales recovered from the pandemic.

ToyotaMotor Corp. posted a profit of 327 billion yen in January-March 2020.The company said quarterly sales rose 11 percent year-over-year to nearly 7.7 trillion yen ($71 billion) from 6.9 trillion yen a year earlier.

The pandemic has cut sales and demand for many businesses, butToyotahas shown resilience against a global semiconductor shortage that has hit many automakers hard.

In the fiscal year ended March, Toyota's profit rose 10 percent to 2.25 trillion yen ($20.6 billion) from 2.04 trillion yen the previous year.Sales for the fiscal year fell nearly 9 percent to 27 trillion yen ($248 billion).

The central Toyota city-based maker of the Prius hybrid and Lexus luxury models said cost-cutting efforts have helped keep it in the red.

Toyota Motor Corp forecasts 2.3 trillion yen ($21 billion) in profit and 30 trillion yen ($276 billion) in sales for the fiscal year ending in March 2022.The company expects auto sales to recover both domestically and abroad.

Sales of Toyota and Lexus-branded vehicles are expected to be 9.6 million in the current fiscal year, compared with 9.1 million in the previous fiscal year.

The company said it expects to sell 2.8 million electric vehicles, up 130 percent from a year earlier.

Roman Schorr of Fitch Ratings said in a recent review that Toyota's strong sales in China have supported its bottom line as it aggressively pushes EV sales in the country.

Operations director Kenta Kon told reporters that demand recovered in the second half of the financial year, despite a drop in sales due to the pandemic.