Toyota, Nissan Sales Rise in January

Thanks to a 20.6% jump in light-truck sales offsetting a flat month for cars, Toyota U.S. deliveries rose 12.1% on a daily-selling-rate basis in January vs. same-month year-ago to 167,056. There were 25 selling days in January 2018 compared with 24 in January 2017.

The No.1 Japanese automaker’s midsize utility vehicles continue to chug along, with gains at both the Toyota and Lexus brands leading to a best-ever January for its light trucks in the U.S., the automaker says.

The Toyota Div., rising 12.4% on a DSR basis, racked up another record month of sales for the RAV4, Highlander and 4Runner, with best-ever January numbers claimed for all three.

The RAV4’s 26,655 units were enough to make it Toyota’s No.1 seller last month, topping the Camry midsize sedan’s 24,638 deliveries.

The RAV4’s tally represented a 15.5% increase from January 2017, while the Camry climbed 16.4% vs. year-ago.

At Lexus, where sales were up 10.4% last month from year-ago, light trucks posted an 18.6% increase thanks to all models but the LX large SUV posting gains. Sales of the NX compact CUV jumped 36.2%, while the RX midsize CUV gained 17.2% on year-ago and the GX midsize SUV inched up 7.6%.

On the car side Lexus dipped, with the brand’s car lineup falling 6.2% on declines of the IS and LS sedans, RC coupe and discontinued CT hatch. Sales of the LS, undergoing a selldown in anticipation of a new generation launching this month, fell 60.2%.

The Toyota Avalon large sedan, also due to be replaced soon, saw sales climb 33.5%, making it the Toyota brand’s No.1-gaining car last month.

Other car models in the black in January at Toyota included the Yaris subcompact sedan (4.9%) and the California-only Mirai hydrogen-fuel-cell sedan, up 146.4% on 213 sales vs. 83 in January 2017.

Taking dives on the car side were the Prius (-14.6%), Yaris Liftback (-87.4%) and the 86 coupe (-35.8%).

Sales of the Corolla compact sedan and hatch also fell, dipping 4.7% to 21,407.

Toyota’s pickups were in the black last month, as was the Sienna minivan, with the latter up 12.6% to 8,548.

The brand’s nearly-year-old C-HR small CUV tallied 3,946 sales last month.

Officials with both brands see a good year ahead, given light-truck momentum, as well as new-model offerings including the Camry, Avalon and LS. Lexus says the LS, a limited-edition LC coupe and the new 3-row RX-L will be followed by 10 additional new or refreshed models this year.

Nissan U.S. sales rose 5.6% on a DSR basis last month to 123,538 units, WardsAuto data shows, with the Nissan brand’s 7.6% gain offsetting an 11.7% loss at Infiniti.

Light trucks also drove Nissan’s results upward, with the automaker seeing an 8.7% climb in sales of utilities and pickups vs. a 1.8% rise in car sales.

At the Nissan brand, about half of its models posted increases, including the Rogue, up 20.8% with a RAV4-topping and January-best 36,184 deliveries. Like Toyota, Nissan also sells a hybrid variant of its midsize CUV, as well as a slightly smaller model, the Rogue Sport. Sales of both additional models are included in the January tally.

The Nissan brand saw its biggest gains from lower-volume models such as the Murano midsize CUV (49.4%), Frontier midsize pickup (46.9%) and Titan fullsize pickup (40.5%).

The Juke small CUV and Leaf electric car had the biggest declines in January, down 86.0% and 81.3%, respectively. The former has been discontinued, while the latter is refreshed for ’18.

At Infiniti, more than half the luxury brand’s models were in the red, including the midsize Q50 sedan and QX50 CUV. The Q50 fell 18.8%, while deliveries of the QX50, due to be replaced with a new second-generation version this spring, dropped 16.3%.

The QX60 3-row CUV was Infiniti’s biggest climber last month, up 32.8%, while the QX80, refreshed for ’18, inched up 0.4%.

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