Overseas sales help Toyota profit

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Japanese car giant Toyota has reported a rise in quarterly profits as demand in emerging markets such as China offset a slowdown in the US.

The firm posted net profits of 458.67bn yen ($4.3bn) in the final three months of 2007, up 7.5% from the same period a year earlier.

Analysts had been expecting a net profit of 455.4bn yen.

Toyota is in a close race with US rival General Motors to be the world's biggest carmaker.

GM has reported global 2007 sales of 9.37 million vehicles - a near dead heat with Toyota's figure.

But Toyota is the more profitable firm.

It kept forecasts for full-year earnings unchanged at 1.7 trillion yen, which, if met, would mark record results for a seventh straight year.

"The earnings themselves were solid but the fact that they did not revise up their forecasts may be a disappointment for short-term investors," said Koichi Ogawa of Daiwa SB Investments.

Despite a downturn in the US, the source of much of their profits, high fuel prices are expected to drive sales of Toyota's Prius and Lexus hybrid cars.