Toyota Motor Corp.’s Lexus, buoyed by consumer discounts, beat out Daimler AG’s Mercedes-Benz and Bayerische Motoren Werke AG’s BMW brand in October to lead monthly U.S. luxury-auto sales for the first time since May. Lexus sales rose 8.1 percent to 21,091 vehicles, the Toyota City, Japan-based automaker said yesterday in a statement. On Nov. 2, BMW reported a 17 percent gain to 19,272 and Mercedes posted an increase of less than 1 percent to 18,351. Lexus, the top-selling U.S. luxury brand since 2000, is being challenged this year as Toyota copes with record recalls and as Mercedes and BMW benefit from new models. Lexus more than doubled average incentive spending in October to $2,152 a vehicle from $923 a year earlier, according to TrueCar.com, an auto pricing website. The Toyota unit has been “much more aggressive than they’ve ever been,” Jim O’Donnell, president of BMW’s North American unit, said in a telephone interview. “We’ve now got Lexus joining the fray where they’ve always stood on the sideline and sort of watched.” – read more from Bloomberg