Fitch, an international rating agency, said in a statement on Wednesday (February 17) that even if the chip shortage continues into the second half of this year, Toyota and Honda have sufficient financial flexibility to withstand risks.

Toyota said in its quarterly report last week that its chip inventory could last for four months and that it did not expect an immediate impact on production. At the same time, Toyota also raised its full year 2021 profit forecast by 54%. Toyota expects its operating profit to set a new record of 2 trillion yen (19.13 billion US dollars) in the 2021 fiscal year.

Honda raised its EBIT target by Y100 billion (US $950 million), which Fitch said showed its success in reducing expenditure. Fitch believed that although Honda's 2021 global sales target was lowered by 2.2%, that is, 100000 vehicles, the chip shortage would not have a significant impact on Honda.

It is reported that the recent earthquake in Japan has also had a certain impact on chip production. In addition, due to extreme weather, the power supply interruption in Texas in the United States has forced some semiconductor factories including NXP semiconductor and Infineon to shut down.

Research firm IHS Markit said the shortage of car chips will affect the production of nearly 1 million light vehicles worldwide in the first quarter of this year, but it still expects most of the vehicles to resume production for the rest of this year.