Not long ago, the top spot among global car companies based on unit sales was a race among Toyota, General Motors, and Volkswagen. The race is not close anymore. Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM | TM Price Prediction) sold 11.2 million cars last year, which includes its Toyota, Lexus, Daihatsu, and truck business Hino Motors. When Toyota and Lexus are considered separately from the others, sales reached 10.3 million.
Volkswagen, likely to take the second place, sold 9.2 million vehicles. It also owns Audi, Porsche, and several other smaller brands. GM has not reported global sales yet, but they are not expected to match those of its Japanese or German rivals. (See which 11 cars are still mostly made in America.)
Along with GM, two other global manufacturers sell over 6 million units yearly (except for a drop in COVID-19 pandemic sales). These are South Korea’s Hyundai/Kia and Stellantis, the Italian company that owns Chrysler.
Electric vehicle sales have picked up enough so that they are a small percentage of sales at each industry giant. However, EV-only Tesla sold 1.8 million cars last year. The stock market considers EVs the vehicles of the future. Because of this, Tesla has a market cap of almost $700 million. Toyota’s is $272 billion, based on NYSE data.
Toyota’s lead is large enough that it is unlikely any other car company will catch it in unit sales over the next several years.
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