皇冠体育app

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Toyota's 皇冠体育app auto finance company fined

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2010-09-21 07:10

HANGZHOU, Zhejiang - Officials from a local administration for industry and commerce in Hangzhou, capital of East 皇冠体育app's Zhejiang province, said Monday it has fined Japanese carmaker Toyota's auto finance unit in 皇冠体育app for involvement in commercial bribery.

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This is the first commercial bribery fine for both Toyota Motor Finance (皇冠体育app) and Toyota Motor Corp, the agency said in a statement.

Toyota Motor Finance (皇冠体育app) Co. offered rebates to encourage three dealers to have customers take loans from Toyota, rather than from local banks, between August 2008 and April 2010, it said.

An investigation showed the one-year leading rate at Toyota Motor Finance (皇冠体育app) Co. was 10 to 13 percent, compared with less than 7 percent at major state-owned commercial banks, it was revealed.

Officials said Toyota Motor Finance (皇冠体育app) Co. offered 4.5 percent of interest earnings as rebates to the three dealers.

The auto finance company illegally took in 426,352 yuan ($63,493) from 49 borrowers after business taxes, officials said.

The agency said it would confiscate all illegal earnings and impose a fine of 140,000 yuan.

Toyota Motor Finance (皇冠体育app), a subsidiary of Toyota Financial Service, was also under a similar commercial bribery investigation in Ningbo City, also in Zhejiang. Toyota Financial Service is the wholly owned car-loan financing firm of Toyota Motor Corp.