The DOT says that the fine — the maximum allowable — is the largest civil penalty the NHTSC has ever assessed against a car maker for failing to report defects until long after they were allegedly discovered. Still, it’s irresistible to mention that the fine would represent $7.12 per car recalled.

Of the $1 billion allocated under the program, $775 million is out the door, catalyzing 184,304 transactions, the department reports.

Six of the top-selling vehicles are foreign, with the Toyota Corolla surpassing the Ford Focus at the top of the list new purchases. The others (in order of popularity) are:  Honda Civic, Toyota Prius, Toyota Camry, Hyundai Elantra, Ford Escape FWD, Dodge Caliber, Honda Fit and Chevrolet Cobalt.

The Transportation Department claims that the average fuel efficiency for the new purchases is 25.3 mpg, while the average mileage for the trade-ins is 15.8 mpg. But the administration is still refusing to release more detailed data surrounding individual transactions.

Analysts said Toyota’s downward revision, its second in two months, showed that the worst financial crisis since the Depression was threatening not just the Big Three but also even relatively healthy automakers in Japan, South Korea and Europe. Many other companies will also soon be reporting losses.

Worse, analysts said that they expected next year to be even more painful, amid forecasts that the global economy would continue to slide until at least the summer. This could cause a significant shakeout, driving smaller and weaker companies into the arms of a smaller number of bigger, richer players.

So for all that talk of “retooling factories” and “Chevy Volts” and “smaller, more fuel-efficient cars,” the message is clear: In this economy, folks aren’t buying any cars — not even Toyota Priuses — largely because they can’t access the credit to finance such a purchase.

The Bush bailout forces the Big Three to craft a plan to return the companies to profitability. Toyota’s news is indication that that task just got much tougher.

Why is that bad news for the Big Three? Because there’s been this line of argument that Ford, General Motors and Chrysler would be performing splendidly right now if only they’d focused more resources on the production of gas-sippers instead of gas-guzzlers. While there’s certainly truth in that criticism, Toyota’s announcement indicates that auto companies are suffering across the board, regardless of what models they’re able to produce. Indeed, Prius sales in November dropped more than 48 percent relative to the same month a year ago.

So even if GM were shooting its plug-in Volt off the assembly line like Pez, it still wouldn’t solve the company’s troubles because the credit crunch and lack of consumer confidence means no one’s buying anyways. That’s a tough message for supporters of the Detroit bailout, who’ve been arguing that the Big Three will be fine if they just get some help retooling their factories to make higher mileage cars.

As David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research, said just a few minutes ago in what’s probably an understatement, “All automakers are in big trouble right now.”