Zoom-Zoom Expects $144 Million Fiscal Year Loss

There's no wonder that automakers announce the lowest sales in the history but it's simply sad to see all the large companies we used to see praising models and revenues crying for government funding. Mazda for example said it expects a $144 million (about 13 million yen) fiscal year loss, due to collapsing sales in the United States. And in case you didn't know, Mazda's initially forecast targeted a 50 billion yen profit, which means the company reduced its estimates by as much as 63 million yen. The Japanese automaker recently started a strong anti-recession campaign, with sales targets reduced 15 percent to 2.55 trillion yen from 3 trillion yen, according to The Detroit News.

Mazda reported a loss of 600 million yen in the third quarter of the fiscal year (October-December), the aforementioned source wrote, compared to a 15.9 billion net profit recorded in the previous year. Moreover, revenues were decreased by 40 percent to 512.4 billion yen.

As you probably know, Mazda isn't the only company that experiences the worst sales in history. Beside the over-discussed situation of the Detroit 3, Japan's leading automaker and currently the world's number one car manufacturer Toyota said in December that 2008 may bring the first operating loss in history. In addition, Toyota struggled to fight the recession with all kinds of cost-cutting measures, including idled plants, job layoffs and lowered productions.

Aside from this, Mazda gets ready to debut two new models at the upcoming Geneva Motor Show which are said to perfectly match the current market demand: low fuel consumption and reduced emissions. The Mazda3 MPS, often referred to as the sport version of Mazda3, will be powered by a 2.3-liter DISI Turbo engine while the newly-developed i-stop variant will bring a 12 percent lower fuel consumption than the current European Mazda3.