Toyota posts $2.2 bln profit as car sales recover (AP)

Toyota reported a quarterly profit of $2.2 billion, reversing from red ink a year earlier as the world's top automaker benefited from a global sales recovery that offset lingering doubts about the safety of its cars.

It's a turnaround from red ink a year ago, but sales remain below previous levels. Toyota reported a quarterly profit of $2.2 billion, reversing from red ink a year earlier as the world's top automaker benefited from a global sales recovery that offset lingering doubts about the safety of its cars.

AP - BACK IN THE BLACK: Toyota posts quarterly profit of $2.2 billion, reversing last year's red ink, as the world's top automaker benefited from cost cuts and a global sales recovery that offset lingering doubts about its cars' safety.

TOKYO — Toyota‘s quarterly profit tripled, driven by a recovery from natural disasters, and the company raised its full-year earnings forecast Monday despite a sales slump in China. Toyota Motor Corp., on track to regain the crown of world’s No. 1 automaker this year, reported a July-September net profit of 257.9 billion yen ($3.2 billion) compared with an 80.4 billion profit a year earlier. The result was better than the 238 billion yen ($3 billion) quarterly profit forecast by analysts surveyed by FactSet.

AFP - The world's biggest automaker Toyota said

The business of making cars is complex and, as the world has recently learned, vulnerable not only to swings in energy prices but also to the economy as a whole. Today, industry analysts are struggling harder to figure out  the short term than the future. “It’s an unbelievably volatile market right now,” says Rebecca Lindland of Global Insight. “It’s never been more difficult to project.”