Toyota denies promising $10bn investment in US after Trump announcement | Toyota

Japanese auto giant Toyota Motor has rejected Donald Trump’s suggestion that it is ready to invest more than $10 billion in the United States in the coming years.

During a visit to Japan earlier this week, the US president claimed he was told the automaker would build “over $10 billion” factories “all over” the US.

“Go out and buy a Toyota,” Trump added.

However, a senior executive at Toyota, the world’s largest automaker, said that although Toyota plans to invest and create new jobs in the United States, this level of investment has not been promised.

The company held meetings with Japanese and American officials before Trump’s visit.

“I think during the first Trump administration the figure was roughly around $10 billion, so we announced that we would continue to invest and provide employment as before, although not to say the same scale,” Hiroyuki Ueda told reporters on the sidelines of the Japan Mobility Show in Tokyo. “So probably around $10 billion came out of that context.”

Saying that Toyota “did not specifically say that we will invest $10 billion in the next few years,” Ueda added that the investment issue was not brought up in the company’s president Akio Toyoda’s conversation with Trump at the US Embassy event on Tuesday.

Trump met with Japan’s new prime minister and first female prime minister, Sanae Takaichi, on Tuesday. He welcomed Takaichi’s promise to step up military build-up and also sign agreements on trade and rare earths.

During the visit, Takaichi vowed to usher in a “golden age” in relations with the United States and “fundamentally strengthen” his country’s defense posture. The two leaders signed an agreement setting out a framework to secure the extraction and processing of rare earths and other minerals.

Reuters contributed reporting.