Japanese Sell Record Number of Cars in United States

Steve Herman
January 7, 2005
Tokyo

Japan's top automakers say they sold a record number of vehicles last year in the United States, but the auto industry is experiencing a slump at home.

Despite a stronger yen, which makes Japanese products more expensive overseas, Toyota, Nissan, and Honda raised their combined share of the U.S. market to more than 30-percent last year. Japan's big-three carmakers sold nearly 4.5 million vehicles in the United States in 2004.

But at home, Japanese automakers saw a drop in sales for the first time in two years. Domestic sales last year fell 1.6 percent to just below four-million vehicles.

Toyota's chairman is predicting Japan's economy overall will grow this year. Hiroshi Okuda is also chairman of the powerful Japan Business Federation, known as Keidanren. Mr. Okuda says he expects that the economies of the United States and China will improve in the second half of the year and that will help Japan's economy expand.

This article was a Japan business report, non-automotive content removed.