Nissan projects annual loss as it drops talks with Japan rival Honda

Nissan faces significant loss after scrapping Honda integration

Robert Besser
17 Feb 2025, 04:38 GMT+10

Nissan projects annual loss as it drops talks with Japan rival Honda

Nissan is bracing for a steep financial loss as it scraps plans for a business integration with Honda, the company announced this week
The Japanese automaker reported a sharp drop in profit for the April-December period, earning just 5.1 billion yen (US$33 million) compared to 325 billion yen the previous year
Nine-month sales declined slightly to 9.14 trillion yen ($59 billion), and Nissan is now forecasting a full-year loss of 80 billion yen ($519 million) for the fiscal year ending in March

TOKYO, Japan: Nissan is bracing for a steep financial loss as it scraps plans for a business integration with Honda, the company announced this week.

The Japanese automaker reported a sharp drop in profit for the April-December period, earning just 5.1 billion yen (US$33 million) compared to 325 billion yen the previous year. Nine-month sales declined slightly to 9.14 trillion yen ($59 billion), and Nissan is now forecasting a full-year loss of 80 billion yen ($519 million) for the fiscal year ending in March.

Alongside the disappointing financial results, Nissan confirmed it has abandoned merger discussions with Honda. Talks, which began in December, originally focused on forming a joint holding company, but Nissan Chief Executive Makoto Uchida said the negotiations had shifted toward making Nissan a subsidiary of Honda—something he deemed "unacceptable."

While the merger is off the table, Uchida said Nissan and Honda will still explore ways to collaborate on electric vehicle development and other research initiatives.

Nissan is now looking to achieve a turnaround independently. The company has already announced plans to cut costs, including shutting down production lines and potentially entire factories and laying off 9,000 workers. Uchida stated that further details on Nissan's restructuring efforts will be shared within a month.