Toyota regains top spot as world’s largest automaker from Volkswagen

Volkswagen has been knocked off the top spot for global auto sales by Toyota as the emissions-rigging scandal bites.

As far as General Motors is concerned, through September they sold 7.2 million cars which is 1.9% less than the same period of previous year and are now in third place with virtually no chances of catching up Toyota and Volkswagen.

Toyota made a big comeback in 2012 however, and has been top for the past three years. Deliveries declined 1.5 per cent for both Toyota and Volkswagen.

“Toyota will be the No. 1 for this year”, Koji Endo, an auto analyst at Advanced Research Japan, told Bloomberg.

Now, the fourth quarter reflects a crucial test for Volkswagen, which is facing numerous investigations and a hail of criticism over its installation of manipulative software on 11 million vehicles to cheat emissions tests.

The German company announced that its cars sold in Morocco have not been affected by emissions fraud adding, “Moroccans who ordered Volkswagen cars have not cancelled their orders”.

VW has now halted the sales of their diesel models in a few markets to be repaired and to meet the required compliance condition. Unfortunately for Volkswagen, a scandal of epic proportions involving its not-so-clean diesel vehicles soured consumers’ opinions, and now Toyota is back to claim its rightful crown.

New figures show that Toyota has regained its spot as world’s largest automaker, unseating Volkswagen in the third calendar quarter of 2015.

The German automaker sat atop the throne for nine months, only to give it away amidst the chaos that is the dieselgate scandal.

Any impact on sales has yet to be felt: VW sales in the United States and Europe actually increased in the nine-month period, even in September when the scandal broke growing 7.3 per cent and 3.8 per cent respectively.