Toyota Motor Corp. (NYSE: TM) seemingly can do no wrong. The world's largest automaker continues to sell passenger cars at a record clip and is a leader in the hybrid vehicle space, with many gasoline-electric SUVs and cars at dealer lots. Can Toyota hold on to the top-sales crown moving forward? It's one thing to take the top spot away from General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM), but it's another to hold on to the top spot consistently, year after year.

The well-publicized meltdown dealing with subprime mortgages (and belly-up mortgage companies) has hit American automakers GM and Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) particularly hard. Or, it's a great excuse by both automakers to explain dropping U.S. sales and inconsistent performance. The word "subprime" comes up at least a dozen times every month when I cover the monthly U.S. sales calls for both automakers. Shh -- just don't tell Toyota.

Although subprime mortgage woes are very real and have affected many areas of the consumer economy in the U.S., Toyota is not using it as an explanation to lower sales forecast. On the contrary - the automaker said yesterday that it was keeping its sales target for U.S. sales this year completely intact. Its reasoning? Well, Toyota believes that the housing sector mess currently in progress is a temporary setback for consumers, not something to drag the country down into recession sometime in the next two months. Add that to Toyota's fuel-efficient vehicle lineup, and the automaker will most likely continue to sit pretty.

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