World’s largest automakers 2014: No change, and none expected

AUTO - WEC 6 HOURS OF FUJI 2014

Toyota and Volkswagen have delivered their 10 month global production and sales numbers, which helps us to update where they stand in this year’s race for World’s Largest Automaker. GM has chosen to keep stockholders and public in the dark, forcing us to perform rough estimates based on quarterly numbers. As you can see, not much has changed since a month ago, and we don’t expect a change in the ranking when the year ends.

World’s Largest Automakers
10 Month 2014
Jan-Oct 2014 Jan-Oct 2013 YoY 2014 proj.
Toyota 8,638,826 8,448,426 2.3% 10,367,000
Volkswagen 8,240,000 7,850,000 5.0% 10,113,000
GM 8,190,826 8,056,404 1.7% 9,829,000
Source: Company data. GM, VW: Deliveries. Toyota: Production. Blue: Estimate
Volkswagen data ex MAN and Scania. Included in estimate

 

Our year-end estimate of Volkswagen’s global production includes an estimated 225,000 heavy trucks and buses produced by MAN and Scania. Their numbers are not contained in VW’s monthly tally, but they will be when the year ends. Even with the heavy iron considered, we expect Toyota to be ahead of runner-up Volkswagen by a comfortable margin.

Volkswagen’s global growth rate is about double the market. Toyota maintains an equilibrium. Volkswagen follows an aggressive growth strategy. Toyota, worried about the economy in future years, decided to keep its powder dry and major CAPEX off the table. While Volkswagen’s chances of taking the #1 spot away from Toyota are slim to none this year, the Wolfsburg carmaker is well poised to overtake Toyota in 2015 as long as the current trajectories remain intact.

This site automatically detects and reports abuse