Affected by the epidemic and semiconductor shortage, Toyota Motor's global production target for April was reduced by 150,000 vehicles

According to Reuters, Toyota Motor announced that it would reduce its global automobile production target by 150,000 vehicles to 750,000 vehicles in April due to the shortage of semiconductors and the COVID-19 pandemic. Toyota Motor added that the company's global average monthly production during the April-June period will be about 800,000 vehicles.

Since March, Toyota has stopped production several times for various reasons, and the impact has been difficult to digest for a while. From March 21 to 23, Toyota announced that it would stop production at 18 production lines in 11 factories due to the earthquake. There are also reports that Toyota will stop production at more factories on March 24 and 25.

From the evening of March 16 to the early morning of March 17, local time, three strong earthquakes occurred in Fukushima, Japan, with the highest magnitude reaching 7.3, causing power outages in Fukushima and Tokyo. Affected by this, Toyota's 18 production lines were suspended, involving models including Crown, Yaris, GR Yaris, LC70, LC300, RAV4, C-HR, Lexus IS, NX, RC, LS, etc., covering almost all of Toyota's best-selling models. It is estimated that the production of 20,000 vehicles will be affected. On March 1, due to a hacker attack, 28 production lines at Toyota's 14 Japanese factories stopped operating, affecting the production of about 13,000 vehicles. On March 14, Toyota once again announced that due to the epidemic, five factories in Changchun City, Jilin Province, China were suspended.

Specifically, in April, including overseas production, Toyota's global production is expected to decrease by 150,000 to 750,000 vehicles (250,000 in Japan and 500,000 overseas). The number provided to suppliers at the beginning of this year included the expected recovery of production cuts, but Toyota has therefore lowered its production due to the shortage of semiconductors. Compared with the forecast at the beginning of the year, the production cuts in May and June were 10% and 5%, respectively. Just a week ago, Toyota said it would cut domestic production in Japan by up to 20% from April to June to ease the pressure on suppliers caused by the shortage of chips and other parts. At present, the new crown epidemic, the escalation of the situation between Russia and Ukraine, the rise in raw material prices, and cyber attacks have brought tremendous pressure to the automotive parts supply chain, and Toyota has therefore adjusted its production plans many times.

Recently, AutoForecast Solutions (AFS), an automotive industry data forecasting company, released the latest data. As of March 20, due to chip shortages, the global auto market has reduced production by about 1.1584 million vehicles this year. Among them, the cumulative reduction in production in the Chinese auto market has increased to 70,900 vehicles, accounting for 6.1% of the cumulative reduction in production in the global auto market. Last week, US electric car manufacturer Rivian warned that supply chain problems may force it to cut its planned production by half this year. German automaker Volkswagen also said on March 15 that due to the chip shortage, the company's sales last year were 2 million units less than originally planned. The company also warned that continued supply bottlenecks, high commodity prices and the situation in Russia and Ukraine could hit its growth in 2022. Toyota, Volkswagen and other automakers have stopped producing cars in Russia after the situation in Russia and Ukraine disrupted the Ukrainian supply chain.

Previously, Toyota Motor Group released its production and sales data for January 2022. Data showed that Toyota's global sales fell to 752,155 vehicles in January 2022, a year-on-year decrease of 2%; global production fell to 630,891 vehicles, a year-on-year decrease of 15%. Specifically, in terms of sales, Toyota's global sales in January were 752,155 vehicles, of which domestic sales in Japan decreased by 13% to 110,371 vehicles due to production delays, but sales in overseas markets performed better, with sales in January of 641,784 vehicles. In terms of production, Toyota's global production in January was 630,891 vehicles, of which 162,640 vehicles were produced in the Japanese domestic market, a decrease of 32%, and 468,251 vehicles were produced in overseas markets, a decrease of 7%. Previous data showed that Toyota's global production in December 2021 was 801,100 vehicles (260,000 vehicles were produced in the Japanese domestic market and 540,000 vehicles were produced in overseas markets), a year-on-year increase of 6%, setting a record high for a single month in December, but after this record, Toyota's production fell into a production cut again in January this year. On December 15 last year, Toyota Motor announced a plan to produce 800,000 vehicles worldwide in January 2022, but only 630,000 were actually produced. Toyota Motor said that the decline in production in January was due to the impact of the epidemic and chip shortages, and was forced to reduce production. Perhaps affected by the decline in production, Toyota Motor's stock price was $213.74 per share in early January this year, and on February 25, the U.S. stock market, the stock price once hit a low of $185.38 per share. In less than a month of trading days, Toyota Motor's market value evaporated by about $51 billion (about RMB 320 billion). As of February 25, Toyota Motor's market value was $256.8 billion (about RMB 1.6 trillion).