Yesterday, IHS Automotive Insight, a global market research agency, issued a report predicting that the earthquake or Japanese vehicle production will shrink by nearly 340,000 vehicles in two weeks. The report pointed out that if the daily average output of Japanese automobiles is estimated at 37,200 vehicles, the total output of production vehicles for two weeks will be 521,000 vehicles. Among them, Toyota accounted for 44% of Japanese auto production, followed by Nissan, which accounted for 12% of total production.

As of March 21, the number of cars outside Japan has already been reduced by about 10,000 cars. As more and more automakers and parts manufacturers are obstructed by the shortage of parts, the output reduction is expected to increase dramatically.

The impact of the earthquake in Japan on the global auto industry began to appear. At present, European and American mainstream car manufacturers have announced that they have had to suspend production at some factories due to the disruption of Japanese parts supply.

General Motors has stopped production at its three plants worldwide due to a shortage of components. The production shutdown plants are located in the United States, Germany, and Spain. The production of GM Korea plants will also slow down for the same reason. Ford Motor's plant in Russia was also forced to stop production.

Volvo’s plants in Sweden and Belgium have stopped production due to the lack of automotive electronics parts from Japan. These accessories are used for navigation and sound systems. About 10% of Volvo's automotive parts come from Japan.

In addition, a supplier of PSA Peugeot Citroën in Japan for an automotive electronic component was damaged during the earthquake, which forced it to slow down the production of diesel engines from the 23rd.

Although most of the Japanese brands sold in the United States are produced in the United States, models such as energy-saving and hybrid vehicles are imported from Japan. Due to the earthquake stoppage, most Japanese imported cars, such as the Toyota Prius sold in the United States [review picture forum], have only a two-month inventory. A website inspection showed that the price of this model was increased by 169 US dollars compared with the prices of a week ago. Subaru, which relied solely on imports, had only 30 days of inventory, and prices rose more rapidly.