Toyota Motor President Koji Sato delivers a speech next to two new electric vehicle concepts, a sports car FT-Se (left) and an SUV FT-3e (right), at the Japan Mobility Show 2023 in Tokyo on Oct 25, 2023. (PHOTO / AFP)

TOKYO - Toyota Motor reported a more than doubling of second-quarter profit on Wednesday, helped by a weak yen and strong sales, and raised its full-year forecast by 50 percent.

The world's top-selling automaker said operating profit for the three months to the end of September rose 155.6 percent from a year earlier to 1.44 trillion yen ($9.52 billion).

The Japanese automaker said it sold more cars in all global regions, including the United States, Asia and its home market, over the six months to end-September compared to the same period a year earlier.

Toyota lifted its full-year profit forecast to 4.5 trillion yen from 3 trillion yen, largely due to favorable effects from foreign exchange rates. It expects the weaker yen to account for 1.18 trillion yen of the revision to the full-year profit.

It said a further boost from cost reduction and marketing efforts and price revisions especially outside of Japan was likely to offset higher expected expenses.

The new projection compared to analysts' average forecast of 4.0 trillion yen.

The quarterly results compared to an average 1.08 trillion yen profit estimate in a poll of 10 analysts by LSEG and a profit of 562.8 billion yen in the same period last year

The quarterly results compared to an average 1.08 trillion yen profit estimate in a poll of 10 analysts by LSEG and a profit of 562.8 billion yen in the same period last year.

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Toyota shares, which were up 4.4 percent just before the release of the earnings, jumped immediately after and were up 5.6 percent at 2,735 yen by 0516 GMT.

Toyota unveiled in June a sweeping revamp of its battery-powered vehicle strategy and committed to technologies to improve the driving range and cut costs of electric vehicles.

It said overnight it would boost investment by $8 billion in a North Carolina plant that will make batteries for hybrids, plug-in hybrids and full-battery vehicles.

In the first nine months of the year it sold 7.5 million cars, which included the Lexus luxury brand, nearly a third of them hybrids. It sold around 76,000 battery EVs, or about 1 percent of total sales, during the same period.

READ MORE: In EV battle, Toyota bets on new tech and old-school thinking

While Toyota has avoided the kind of hit other Japanese automakers such as the rise of domestic brands, Toyota still faces pressure in the world's biggest auto market.

It also faces a battle in Southeast Asian markets such as Thailand.