Toyota Motor Corp. and Honda Motor Co., Japan's two biggest automakers, led the seventh straight increase in the nation's monthly auto sales as government incentives boosted demand.
Sales of cars, trucks and buses, excluding minicars, rose 35 percent to 294,887 vehicles in February from a year earlier, the Japan Automobile Dealers Association said in a statement Monday. Toyota sold 146,145 units, excluding Lexus-brand cars, up 48 percent.
Japan's auto sales began recovering from a yearlong slide in August as government rebates and tax cuts for fuel-efficient vehicles helped rekindle demand. The incentives helped raise sales by about 600,000 vehicles last year and may increase them by about 900,000 this year, the Japan Automobile Manufacturers Association said at the end of December.