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Toyota Camry, Honda Civic inventories mounting as US automakers make inroads

Two of the hottest-selling cars in America aren't quite as hot as they used to be. The Toyota Camry and Honda Civic are both seeing dealer supplies increase in the face of renewed competition from the much-improved Detroit Three.
According to a report from The Detroit News, the Camry's dealer inventory is 15 days higher than its seasonal average, while the Civic is 25 days above average. Things aren't expected to get better for Toyota and Honda, as RBC Capital Markets analyst Joseph Spak marked the two Japanese offerings as "at risk for reduced output."
The Detroit Three, meanwhile, are seeing supplies dwindle as demand increases, especially for the Ford Fusion, which has seen an 18-percent increase in 2013 sales, and the Chevrolet Cruze, which was second only to the Camry in June 2013 sales.

Toyota plans biggest stock buyback in over a decade

At the end of December, 2013 Toyota had a cash stockpile of 1.8 trillion yen ($17.5B US). As of March 31, at the end of its current financial year, company coffers are expected to swallow another 1.9 trillion yen ($18.4B US) in net profit - said to be a record sum for the Japanese automaker. In a gesture signaling a turnaround from the horrors of the global recession, Bloomberg reports that Toyota will buy back 60 million shares of its stock, as much as 1.89 percent of the company, for something like 360 billion yen ($3.5B US). It's the first buyback since 2009 and the largest buyback since 2003, when it spent roughly 390 billion yen ($3.8B US) repurchasing shares.
Company president Akio Toyoda founded the Toyota Mobility Foundation (TMF), a non-profit that will support international groups working on transportation issues in emerging markets. Half of the stock that Toyota buys, 30 million shares, will be sold to the foundation via the Japanese Trustee Services Bank for one yen per share, the dividend providing the foundation's initial funding. The other 30 million shares will be canceled, a company spokesman telling Reuters that the company wants to reward shareholders.
Industry analysts have been asking Toyota to either return money to shareholders or invest in new factories, but Toyota has ruled out the latter. After getting burned with excess capacity when the financial crisis came, the company is focused on extracting efficiencies from the plants it already has. Toyota has said it plans to complete the buyback by June of this year.

Toyota JV will sell Leahead EVs in China next year

You may have read that Toyota is about to establish a new electric vehicle sub-brand in China called Leahead that will focus on "cheap electric cars aimed at young and hip car buyers in China." This isn't 100 percent true, but the Japanese automaker is revving its electric motors for EVs in China, in a fashion. It makes sense for automakers to push for more EVs in China, given government support for the technology and the proven success of Tesla there. Low-speed EVs are popular, as well. Indirectly, Toyota is going to sell electric vehicles to Chinese customers next year. We've heard reports before that Toyota is interested in going electric in China, with a different Toyota JV and thus a different brand but now we have an official word on Toyota's future EV moves in China, direct from Jana Hartline, the environmental communications manager for Toyota Motor Sales, USA. Hartline told AutoblogGreen that Toyota just celebrated the 10-year anniversary of GAC Toyota Motor Co., Ltd (GTMC), its joint-venture manufacturing company in China. And it is GTMC, not Toyota directly, that is the company behind Leahead (called Ling Zhi in Chinese). Leahead will begin selling EVs under the Ling Zhi brand starting in 2015. So, yes, indirectly, Toyota is going to sell electric vehicles to Chinese customers next year. There are rumors that the new EVs will be electric versions of the Corolla EX and/or the Yaris L, but we've got nothing confirmed on that front. We will be waiting for more new at the Shanghai Motor Show next April.