If anybody will again blather about a “weak yen” that has been “manipulated by the Japanese government,” then I’ll personally come visit, with the intent to insert a sock in the mouth. For reasons explicable only to forex mavens, the currency of the economic basked case Japan keeps on getting stronger. Japan’s car manufacturers think this will continue, and they are taking precautions. More precisely, they are taking production out of Japan. (Read More…)

Japanese transport minister Seiji Maehara came to Washington and called on his U.S. counterpart Ray LaHood. Both agreed “that massive recalls of Toyota Motor Corp. vehicles should not hurt the Japan-U.S. alliance and economic relations,” Japanese officials quoted by The Nikkei [sub] said.

LaHood answered Maehara that the U.S. government is treating Toyota in a fair manner, and that Washington is handling the matter based on rules. (Rimshot.) (Read More…)

Ah, the amount of ingenuity electric cars trigger. They need to get charged. Cheaply. They need to get rid of the bad rap that creating electricity isn’t the environmentally friendliest endeavor on this planet. So what about wind power? Comes with its own set of problems. Mitsubishi and the Tokyo Institute of Technology got together and devised a method to use excess wind power to charge electric vehicles while saving the power company gobs of money, a.k.a. the dreaded capex problem. The result? A true wind-wind situation! (Read More…)

With all the tie-ups going on between Japanese and mostly European car makers, conventional wisdom had it that Honda would not take part in the nampa with the gaijin. Everybody saw them stay pure and Nipponese. Not so, said Executive Vice President Koichi Kondo yesterday to The Nikkei [sub]. They would very much like a little tete-a-tete with attractive suitors. They were the wallflower, because they were too shy and awkward. Now, Honda is ready to play. (Read More…)

Move over! A Tokyo taxi.

Forget about the crafty Japanese starving off any attempt of honest American companies to penetrate the Japanese market. A true blue American company, founded by true blue American venture capital, goes right for the heart of Japan: Tokyo’s taxi market. (Read More…)

The French-Japanese relations continue to bloom. Here is the latest tie-up. Forget former on-again, then off-again relationships. This time, it’s serious. The Nikkei [sub] reports that Mitsubishi Motors and France’s PSA have tied the knot and will jointly breed new sports utility vehicles. (Read More…)

As a further sign that (most) of the world is slowly crawling out of the dumps, Japanese car companies report (sometimes sharp) increases in overseas production, says The Nikkei [sub]. (Read More…)

One would think that with all the recalls, Toyota would be looking at a hefty loss for fiscal 2009, which ended on March 2010. Toyota itself thought the same. Well, not hefty, but last projections saw a loss in the neighborhood of $200m. A loss is a loss, and it would have been the 3^rd lost year in a row. Toyota bean counters went over the books with a fine tooth comb. And guess what they found? (Read More…)

Yabe! (Oh shoot.) As the sun set over Toyota City and Tokyo, Toyota’s execs and Sararimen (salary men) alike were crying in their sake. Today was a sai aku (very bad) day. A day everybody at Toyota most likely would want to forget. No, no recall for a change. There isn’t much left to recall anyway, or so it seems.

The sai aku day started with Moody’s downgrading Toyota’s formerly stellar credit rating to “its lowest-ever level,” as The Nikkei [sub] laments. Moody’s came to the somewhat belated conclusion that “multi-million vehicle recalls and safety issues raise questions about its profitability and ability to stay ahead of rivals on pricing power until 2012 at the earliest.”

To make matters even more sai aku, Moody’s warned that its outlook for the rating remains negative. Why the pessimism? (Read More…)

Talk about unfortunate timing: Just as the scrapping incentives all around the world are running out, a Japanese company found a way to turn old cars into fuel. (Read More…)

The volcano on Iceland spews trouble for auto manufacturers. Ever since most of Europe has been declared a no-fly zone, just-in-time bit the dust. Literally.

Today, the lines stopped at the BMW factory in Dingolfing, writes Automobilwoche [sub]. On Wednesday, the lines will stop moving in Regensburg and on Thursday in Munich. More than 7000 bimmers are affected. The reason: Electronic parts that usually get flown in.  Icelandic ash brings production lines all over the globe to a grinding halt … (Read More…)

A few weeks ago, I wrote about how cynical I was becoming about the sudden SUA syndrome with Toyota and how I found it amazing how quite a lot of these cases involve our more “mature” members of society. I used the story of Miss Myrna Marseilles, 76, who crashed her 2009 Toyota Camry (which was fixed the under the recall program), into the wall of a YMCA.

I inferred in the article that this was simply a case of driver error and nothing more and some people agreed with me. Peregrine Falcon bet $20 that this was down to pedal confusion. 210delray reckoned it had “all the elements of pedal misapplication”. Well, Peregrine Falcon, if anyone took you up on that bet, it’s time to collect. We were right. (Read More…)

Toyota Motor Corp. has agreed to pay a $16.4 million civil fine levied by the U.S. government, reports The Nikkei [sub]. They will not admit any wrongdoing and can claim that they never admitted to knowingly hiding defects from regulators, said a senior U.S. Transportation Department official. On Friday, it wasn’t clear whether the DOT would accept the dough with a deal attached. (Read More…)

Japan’s domestic car trade can look back at the first up year in seven years. Japan goes by the fiscal year, which spans from April 1 in the current year to March 31 in the next. In the 2009 fiscal, domestic sales of new vehicles rose 10 percent on the year. You think that’s an occasion to head down to your favorite Ginza hostess bar, break out the sake, or stronger stuff, and party like it’s 2003? Chigaimasu. Quite the opposite is true. The land of the rising sun is worried about falling sales. “A strong sense of anxiety continues to grip the industry,” reports The Nikkei [sub]. (Read More…)

On April 5, the NHTSA levied their largest civil penalty in recorded history. $16,375,000 against Toyota,  because “they knowingly hid a dangerous defect for months from U.S. officials and did not take action to protect millions of drivers and their families.” When we reported that, people thought Toyota would just appeal and drag it out. Not so easy, said The Nikkei [sub]. Toyota is between a rock and a hard place: “Admitting to the charge could strengthen the cases of car owners suing the firm, while refuting it risks inflaming U.S. public opinion.”  Toyota found a way out. (Read More…)