Halftime Score: Toyota Leads GM in Global Sales
By Michelle Krebs July 23, 2008By Michelle Krebs
Toyota widened its lead over General Motors in global sales during the second quarter, increasing the odds that 2008 will mark the end of GM's 77-year-reign as global sales king.
GM reported Wednesday it had sold 2.28 million vehicles in the second quarter that ended June 30 for a decline of 5 percent from the year-ago quarter. Toyota, meantime, reported its sales rose 1.8 percent in the three-month period to about 2.41 million vehicles.
That put the halftime sales score at Toyota's 4.8 million vehicles to GM's 4.5 million.
Toyota Widens Its Lead
GM lagged Toyota in the first quarter of 2007 but came from behind to beat the Japanese automaker in global sales for the year. However, it won by a scant 3,100 vehicles.
In 2008, however, Toyota is widening the lead with every quarter.
In the first quarter, Toyota outsold GM by 160,000 vehicles. In the second quarter, Toyota outsold GM by another 130,000 more vehicles, putting Toyota's halftime lead at nearly 300,000 vehicles ahead of GM.
Toyota's lead over GM is occurring largely because Toyota, though posting sales declines from a year ago, isn't doing quite as badly at GM in the U.S. and its sales in other markets are climbing faster than GM's.
However, both automakers have been scaling back their forecasts for industry sales as well as cutting and shifting production of large trucks and SUVs to smaller, more fuel-efficient ones.
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