Toyota Leads Drop in Japan Car Sales After March Earthquake

Toyota Motor Corp., Japan’s largest carmaker, and Honda Motor Co. led a 23 percent drop in domestic vehicle sales, the 10th straight monthly decline, after the nation’s March 11 earthquake disrupted production.

Sales of cars, trucks and buses, excluding minicars, fell to 225,024 vehicles in June, the Japan Automobile Dealers Association said in a statement today. Toyota’s deliveries declined 38 percent from a year earlier to 87,671, excluding Lexus-brand cars. Sales at Honda, the nation’s third-largest automaker, dropped 32 percent to 30,040.