New man takes up unenviable job at time of crisis. Sound familiar? Akio Toyoda’s ascent to the helm at Toyota Motor won’t transfix half the world, but it will surely inspire a hopeful frisson among jaded investors. Toyota, after all, needs all the help it can get. The world’s largest automaker has gone from generating Japan’s biggest profit pile to red ink in five years. In 2008, Toyota’s worldwide sales shrank by 5 per cent to a smidgen fewer than 8m units. The company dared not even hazard predictions for this year; visibility barely stretches beyond the windscreen. Just two years ago the Japanese automaker’s market capitalisation was almost $300bn; today it is closer to $100bn.

While the market rout means certain comparisons continue to stand – Toyota is still worth more than the entire Thai stock market, for example – investors have slapped used-car price stickers on the erstwhile giant. Toyota trades below its book value and eight times trailing earnings. Of course, the global car pool is littered with bargain basement prices. But other marked-down models do not have $20bn in cash and equivalents on their balance sheets instead of legacy liabilities, nor do they operate state-of-the-art plants that make covetable cars.