Toyota Motor Corp.’s Lexus, which lost its crown as the top-selling luxury auto brand in the U.S. last year, boosted sales 34 percent last month to move past Daimler AG’s Mercedes-Benz and Bayerische Motoren Werke AG.

It’s the first time the Japanese luxury brand beat both of its German competitors to be No. 1 in monthly sales since December 2010 before inventory was hurt by last year’s natural disasters in Asia. Lexus sold 24,237 vehicles in August, the Toyota City, Japan-based company said in a statement.

While Lexus won the month, it still trails Mercedes by almost 18,000 and BMW by more than 14,000. Toyota’s brand has a “very low” chance of closing such a large gap in the final four months of 2012, said Jesse Toprak, an industry analyst with TrueCar.com, a website that follows auto sales. 

“You can’t count them out,” he said yesterday. “This month was a great example of Lexus’s resilience in terms of their brand loyalty and the potential they can tap into if they become aggressive with their marketing efforts.”

U.S. sales of Mercedes rose 11 percent to 20,557 last month, extending its lead in the race for the luxury crown this year to more than 3,800 over BMW. Mercedes U.S. sales through August rose 14 percent to 168,462, according to the Stuttgart, Germany-based automaker.

“With an all-time record setting year so far and now with exciting product in the pipeline, including the all-new GL-Class currently on its way to dealers across the country, we plan to build on this momentum through the end of the year,” Steve Cannon, head of Mercedes in the U.S., said in a statement.

Mercedes’ expanded on its previous lead over BMW of more than 100 U.S. deliveries through July. The sales results don’t include Daimler’s cargo vans and Smart cars and BMW’s Mini brand, which aren’t luxury vehicles.

The BMW brand, helped in July by incentives aimed at encouraging dealers to buy demo vehicles, declined 19 percent in August to 16,835. BMW, which overtook Lexus last year to become the top-selling luxury brand in the U.S., sold 164,636 through August, a 5.6 percent gain, the Munich-based company said. BMW beat Mercedes last year by 2,715 deliveries in the U.S.

“August numbers showed how tight the supply of new vehicles has been for us,” Ludwig Willisch, head of BMW of North America, said in a statement.

Willisch has predicted that the BMW brand will again finish No. 1 following the introduction of the redesigned 3 Series sedan. The all-wheel-drive version of the compact sedan and new X1 compact sport-utility vehicle are expected to boost company sales, BWM has said. 

(Bloomberg)