Toyota's Credit Upgrade Makes It Japan's Only Company to Get R&I's Top Rating

(Bloomberg) -- Toyota Motor Corp.’s credit rating was upgraded to AAA by Japan’s Rating and Investment Information Inc., making it the only company in the country to have the highest rating, as well as the sole domestic issuer ranked above the sovereign.

R&I said the outlook for the nation’s largest automaker was stable, citing high production efficiency and “excellent” technological and development capabilities. Toyota lost the highest rating in 2012, when it was downgraded one notch to AA+ due to the toll of the financial crisis and multiple natural disasters. That put it on par with the Japanese government, whose sovereign rating has remained at that level ever since, affirmed most recently in December.

S&P Global Ratings and Moody’s Investors Service both rank Toyota at their fourth-highest levels of AA- and Aa3, respectively.

To contact the reporter on this story: Lily Nonomiya in Tokyo at lnonomiya@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Yusuke Miyazawa at ymiyazawa3@bloomberg.net, Gearoid Reidy

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