In recent years, Mitsubishi's cross-town counterparts, Honda and Toyota, have been racking up record sales and profits, with the former showing steady growth, while the latter is taking over the world. Unfortunately, the tri-diamond folks haven't been fairing nearly as well. Mitsubishi has been in the red for four years now, mainly due to lackluster products (EVO aside) and a number of scandals that involved cover-ups and quality issues.

As of yesterday, that's all changed – well, at least the automaker's bottom line. For the first time since the fiscal year 2002 (ends in March), Mitsubishi has turned a profit of 8.7 billion yen or $73 million US. The reason for the turnaround stems from a weak yen and an annual sales increase of around four-percent.

Hopefully, that incremental growth on Mitsu's part can be sustained and from what we've been told by the automaker's execs, sales of the new Lancer are a big part of it. If Mitsubishi can extend some of that mojo across its lineup, DSM fans will have a reason to rejoice, again.