In the auto industry, sometimes it pays to avoid the recent fashion. In the late 1990s, when the mantra of auto consultants was that all but the biggest car companies must merge or die, Honda (HMC) remained fiercely independent and flourished....More recently, Honda largely sidestepped the stampede to sell Americans bigger and heavier SUVs and pickups.

Honda's U.S. auto sales through November are down 5.4% to 1.34 million vehicles. That's not good, but it's better than the U.S. Big Three, which have seen sales decline by more than 20%. It's also better than Toyota (TM) and Nissan (NSANY), whose sales have slipped 13.4% and 9.4%, respectively.

Combined with growth in China and other emerging markets, that partly explains why in October Honda assembled 370,000 autos around the world, more than any month in its history. It also explains why among Japan's Big Three automakers Honda appears to be the most optimistic for the months ahead. Indeed, while Toyota and Nissan cut their annual net profit projections by 68% and 52%, respectively, at the end of the last quarter, Honda said its full-year earnings will only be 1% shy of its original target of $5.2 billion.
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Combined with growth in China and other emerging markets, that partly explains why in October Honda assembled 370,000 autos around the world, more than any month in its history. It also explains why among Japan's Big Three automakers Honda appears to be the most optimistic for the months ahead. Indeed, while Toyota and Nissan cut their annual net profit projections by 68% and 52%, respectively, at the end of the last quarter, Honda said its full-year earnings will only be 1% shy of its original target of $5.2 billion

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...121201924.html
They," in this case, would be Honda, maker of all things Acura. And what "they" did this time around was give the TL a definitive, sporting personality -- a persona that is a distinct TL persona in the way that the BMW 3-Series identity fits the BMW 3-Series and nothing else.