Toyota's Credit Ratings Lower Technology ** Partner Has Heavy Price

The higher yen has eroded Toyota’s profits. According to Kyodo News, the "Rating and Investment Information Center" (R&I), a Japanese domestic rating agency, recently announced that it will downgrade the credit ratings of Toyota Motor Corp. and two Toyota Group companies from AAA to AA+. The reason is that these companies "have not taken a full measure of appreciation of the yen."

Credit rating is one of the reference standards for investors when buying corporate bonds. The rating of Japan’s largest automakers has been lowered, reflecting the status quo of the manufacturing industry that is in trouble due to the appreciation of the yen.

The other two companies whose ratings were lowered are Denso's Denso and Toyota Finance. Analysts pointed out that due to its large scale, the Toyota Group has spent too much time dealing with environmental changes after the global financial crisis. Since 2012 will still face many problems such as the European debt crisis and inflation in emerging countries, the risk of appreciation of the yen is still there.

Although the market generally believes that the Japanese economy will ensure growth of around 2% in 2012, there are also market participants who worry that if the U.S. economy recovers slowly, it may further trigger the depreciation of the dollar and the appreciation of the yen.

Toyota 2012, profit or erosion According to Reuters news, due to the yen's strength eroding Toyota Motor Corp’s export profits, it plans to make North America a large export base. Toyota also stated that it intends to reduce its domestic auto export volume in Japan.

Since it will take time for North America to create a large export base, the main reasons for the yen’s revaluation are the European debt crisis and inflation in emerging countries, which cannot be eliminated in the short term. In 2012, the yen continued to rise, and Toyota’s profits would be greatly reduced.

As early as September 2011, Toyota had considered moving its South Korean models to the United States for production instead of domestic production in Japan. Yoshimi Inaba, president and chief operating officer of Toyota North America, said that Toyota currently produces 12 models in the United States, each of which has the potential to export.

It is reported that in 2010 Toyota exported 19,700 cars from the United States to 19 countries (mainly the Middle East). If the North American Free Trade Zone is included, Toyota will export 100,000 cars from North America.

Toyota has built a large export base in North America or is related to the sluggish US market. According to reports, although Toyota occupied the top spot in the world auto industry in 2010, in the US market, Toyota is the only large-scale vehicle manufacturer with a declining sales volume, with annual sales of 1.76 million. At the worst time, the shadow of Toyota cars could not be seen in the United States. Car rental companies banned the rental of Toyota cars, and used car companies banned sales of Toyota cars.

It is reported that in 2012, Toyota Motor Corporation plans to sell more than 1 million vehicles in the Chinese market, and the target increase is more than 10%. Toyota's production accounts for 2/5 of Japan's total production, so Toyota is more vulnerable to the yen than Nissan and Honda.

At the same time, in 2012, Toyota opened its "mixed game 2012."

In the eyes of the outside world, Toyota has been stubbornly sticking to the "oil-electricity mix," although this is not within the scope of the policy plan for the new energy auto industry. However, Toyota astutely believes that hybrid electric or plug-in hybrid power is more in line with current demand, as hybrid vehicles are not subject to supporting conditions.

As Toyota’s vice president, Nakayama Takeshi, put it, “For now, the potential of electric vehicles is not enough to replace traditional cars. He believes that hybrid technology is a very effective energy-saving and environmentally friendly technology. From the current point of view, We think plug-in hybrid vehicles should be a good vehicle for popularization as a new energy vehicle."

Analysts believe that although it was accused of lagging behind Nissan and Mitsubishi in the mass production of electric vehicles, the power density and charging time of power batteries are still not perfect for Toyota, which is known for its prudence, and charging facilities are not perfect. Putting electric cars into production is not a wise business.

The price of the technical blockade of partners in China In 2011, Toyota Motor Corporation was not only seriously affected by natural disasters, but it was also plagued by a strong yen for a long time. It also faced fierce competition from American, European and South Korean automakers.

According to the latest letter from Toyota Motor (China) Investment Co., Ltd., the company sold about 883,000 vehicles in mainland China in 2011, an increase of only 4% year-on-year. Toyota Motor Corporation sold 885,000 vehicles in mainland China, Hong Kong, and Macau in 2011, basically fulfilling the sales target of 900,000 units that was originally established. For Toyota Motor, the past 2011 was not good.

On the contrary, in the Chinese market, the Volkswagen Group (China) is booming and sales continue to grow. Despite the cancellation of new car purchase restrictions and auto consumption incentive policies, China’s auto market growth rate has stabilized, but in December 2011, Volkswagen’s sales volume in the Chinese market was approximately 140,000, which was significantly higher than the 100,000 vehicles in 2010; In terms of annual sales, sales in the Chinese market increased from 1.92 million in 2010 to 2.25 million, an increase of 17.2%.

Toyota had been criticized for its conservative strategy. Compared with Nissan and Honda, Toyota is more willing to maintain a tight technical blockade on its partners in China. This to a certain extent makes Toyota, the world's number one automaker, difficult to pull away from its opponents in China. Instead, it is overtaken by Nissan and lost. Its position as the first brand in Japan.

In the global market, Volkswagen has even caught Toyota by surprise.

Volkswagen recently announced its annual sales figures. In 2011, Volkswagen’s global sales increased by 14% over the previous year to more than 8 million vehicles, which is higher than Toyota’s recent expectations. Therefore, Volkswagen exceeded Toyota for the first time, becoming the second-largest car sales volume in the world.

Toyota Motor was affected by the Japanese tsunami and the Fukushima nuclear crisis. Its sales volume in 2011 was 7.9 million vehicles (covering Lexus, Daihatsu, and Hino), down 6% year-on-year.

At the beginning of 2011, Toyota Motor announced that its sales volume had ranked first in the world for three consecutive years. However, two major global recalls affected its sales. Since taking measures to repair feet, pedals and other defects that caused safety problems in September 2009, Toyota Motor has recalled 16 million cars worldwide, which is almost equivalent to Toyota's total sales in the last two years.

Although Toyoda Motors’ president Akio Toyoda strived to make up for obstacles in markets around the world, the butterfly effect caused by the recalled door still caused the Toyota's industrial chain and even the global auto industry to be affected to varying degrees.

To handle the recall, Toyota also paid the U.S. government a fine of nearly 50 million U.S. dollars. This is only trauma. The biggest internal injury is that people have lost their loyalty and trust in Toyota vehicles for many years. The continuous recall of more than a year has broken the myth that "Toyota is made in Japan." The customer's doubts about the quality of Toyota Motor eventually led to a rapid decline in Toyota's global sales and its market share was snatched by rivals.