NAGOYA -- Toyota Motor President Akio Toyoda acknowledged Wednesday that the going has gotten tough for his company, but he showed no sign of slackening the automaker's longer-term pursuit of greater competitiveness.
With the yen rising against the dollar, Japan's biggest automaker said it expects group operating profit to fall 40% to 1.7 trillion yen ($15.6 billion) for the year ending in March 2017. That would mark Toyota's first decline since fiscal 2011, when its supply chain was reeling from a devastating earthquake in northeastern Japan.
