Steady sales in Europe and North America gave Toyota an impressive 32 percent profit bump in its quarterly numbers, sending the automaker on its way to a seventh year of record earnings.

The company's operating profit for the April-June reporting period was $5.67 billion with net profit also up 32 percent and revenue up 15.7 percent.

Toyota, the largest and most profitable carmaker in the world, has a value of approximately $215 billion, a capitalization fully ten times larger than that of General Motors.

Last year Toyota bumped GM off the "largest automaker" throne after the American company had claimed the title for 75 years. Toyota bested the Detroit giant in sales by 128,000 units.

Toyota's success in both North America and Europe are due largely to the popularity of the Prius hybrid and the RAV4 crossover. The automaker is known for producing fuel efficient vehicles and running a tight operation with an emphasis on cost-cutting strategies.

In spite of heavy expenditures on technologies that look to the next generation in both environmental impact and safety, Toyota has an unprecedented operating margin of almost 10 percent of sales.

Competitor Honda Motor Co. reported markedly higher quarterly profits last week although the third-ranked Japanese company, Nissan Motor Co., had a worse-than-predicted profit drop.

Although both Ford and GM reported profit gains for the second quarter, the latest figures out of Japan clearly show that the American automakers have a long way to go to catch up with their Asian rivals.