Toyota Temporarily Turns Off Production Tap at Two Plants

It was only last year that the recently crowned “world's largest carmaker” looked unstoppable. Toyota, with its stalwart reputation

is nevertheless caught up in the global economic crisis like every other carmaker, with sales of its namesake brand down 27-percent in November (660cc kei cars excluded) and Lexus deliveries down some 24-percent.

The result will be a two day-long production stoppage at Lexus' Tahara, Japan plant, which builds IS, GS and LS models, removing about 5,000 vehicles from inventory according to Automotive News, while production at a Toyota plant will also be halted for the same period.

The lower sales announcement that most are expecting at the company's year-end press conference shouldn't affect its global sales leadership, although sales of General Motors cars, the current number two automaker, are stronger in BRIC nations, especially Brazil where it is the number four automaker compared to Toyota's extremely poor showing. This bad news will follow the near 1 trillion yen ($10.7 billion) pulled from the automaker's annual profit forecast last month.