Toyota Prez: Dollar Too Weak At Y107

TOKYO December 19, 2003; Yoshio Takahashi writing for Dow Jones reported that the president of Toyota Motor Corp. said Friday the dollar is too weak, underscoring concerns among some Japanese exporters about damage to their earnings from a stronger yen.

"I don't think the fundamentals of the Japanese economy are so strong. At the current Y107 level, (the dollar) has swung a bit too much toward yen strength," said Toyota President Fujio Cho.

Japanese monetary authorities have fought a fierce battle against the swooning dollar this year in an effort to prevent a yen surge from hurting the nation's exporters. Their yen-selling intervention, though, has raised the ire of some U.S. automakers, which are facing increasingly heated competition on their home turf from Japanese rivals.

Toyota, Japan's top automaker and a major exporter, has said it expects the dollar to average Y105 during the six-month period through March. The dollar was trading at Y107.68 at 0625 GMT Friday.