TOKYO -- Toyota Motor Corp. sold 10.59 million vehicles globally last year, fewer than the 10.83 million delivered by German rival Volkswagen AG, the Japanese automaker said Wednesday.
Separately, the Nissan-Renault-Mitsubishi alliance reported that its combined global sales stood at 10.76 million vehicles, up 1.4 per cent from the previous year.
Nissan Motor Co.'s global sales totalled 5.65 million vehicles last year, while Renault SA of France, which owns 43 per cent of Nissan, recorded global sales of 3.9 million vehicles. Nissan owns 34 per cent of smaller Japanese rival Mitsubishi Motors Corp., which sold 1.2 million vehicles last year.
The numbers released Wednesday underscore intense competition among the automakers.
U.S. automaker General Motors Co. was the No. 1 selling automaker for more than seven decades before losing the title to Toyota in 2008. Its sales have shrunk in recent years, and the Detroit-based automaker is no longer really a contender in what is turning out to be a three-way race.
Nissan, Japan's second biggest automaker, has been rocked by the arrest in November of its former chairman Carlos Ghosn, who was dispatched by Renault in 1999 and led Nissan for two decades.
The allegations against Ghosn centre around financial misconduct, such as underreporting compensation from Nissan and having Nissan shoulder investment losses. Ghosn has said he is innocent.
Toyota's vehicle sales last year rose 2 per cent from 2017; while Nissan's fell nearly 3 per cent. Mitsubishi's jumped 18 per cent year-on-year, and Renault's sales climbed 3 per cent.
