Honda lowers forecasts, sees dip in quarterly profit after recall expenses counter cheap yen

Honda Motor Co., the Japanese automaker at the center of an air-bag defect scandal, lowered its annual earnings forecast after quarterly profit slipped 15 percent.

The poor results announced Friday by the Tokyo-based manufacturer of the Odyssey minivan, Fit subcompact and Asimo robot came despite a perk it got from the cheap yen, a plus for Japanese exporters.

Honda recorded a 136.5 billion yen ($1.16 billion) profit for the three months through December 2014, in line with forecasts by analysts.

Honda says it was hurt by recall expenses, mainly in North America. Honda has been the hardest hit by the quality woes over Takata Corp. air-bags that explode. It relied on that Japanese supplier most heavily.