US Yaris to be imported from France ?

[daf62757]

Originally Posted by nookandcrannycar

Are you implying a variant on James Carville's famous phrase ('It's the Yen, stupid' instead of "It's the economy, stupid"). If not, you are missing the mark, because that;s how you sound. Hmm...who am I going to think might have the most credible information, you or Reuters. I think I'll go with Reuters, especially when the information in their article makes sense. The Reuters article (Toyota to move Yaris North American production to France) lists the Yen AND soaring energy costs as reasons Toyota made this decision. Later in the article they mention three headwinds that are facing all Japanese auto manufacturers---1. costly labor regulations, 2. high corporate taxes, and 3. a post earthquake energy policy deadlock. If soaring energy costs were ONLY attributable to the value of the Yen, why would they list the energy costs as a separate reason? They wouldn't.

Of course it is a 'you do the math' scenario with the value of the Yen likely being the dominant factor...BUT it is not the ONLY factor.

I wasn't thinking of only the Yaris, I was using the Japanese market as a whole. They are building factories all over the world that produce the same car. In Indiana, they just built a Honda plant to build the same line as the Canada plant. They also have an Ohio plant.

If you use the Yaris as the model, you would probably be right, but from a macro perspective, they are going to build cars at factories where the profit margins are higher in relation to the value of the yen vs the country's currency.