Toyota Motor Corp,Japan's top automaker,said quarterly operating profit jumped more than five-fold to $3 billion and would treble in the current year as vehicle production roars back from post-disaster lows. January-March operating profit increased to 238.5 billion yen beating a consensus estimate of 223 billion yen in a survey of 23 analysts by Thomson Reuters I Fourth-quarter net profit jumped to 121 billion yen from 25.4 billion yen a year ago. For the year to next March,Toyota forecast operating profit would rise to 1 trillion yen ($12.54 billion),its highest since the global financial crisis. Consensus forecasts have been for a full-year profit of 990 billion yen. Toyota shares have gained more than a third since the broad market trough in late-November,outperforming local rivals Nissan and Honda,US competitors General Motors and Ford and Volkswagen,but lagging BMW's 41 percent jump. The main Topix share index is up by a tenth over the same period.
