From National Review:
Electric vehicles (and, critically, their batteries) have improved and will continue to improve, as manufacturers try to address consumer concerns. That’s how things are supposed to work. The problem continues to be that governments and regulators are not allowing the EV market to evolve organically. The result has been an increasing (and increasingly expensive) mismatch between EV supply and demand, a problem that climate policy-makers ultimately plan on “solving” with coercion, because that’s what central planners do.
As I have alluded to in past blogs, to me the EV future is still in doubt. In the U.S. it appears that the present financial status of EV producers is a mixed bag.
From CNN Business:
GM said it expects its North American EV business to turn a profit in the second half of the year. That and strong demand for traditional gasoline-powered vehicles allowed it to raise its earnings forecast for the year.
Reaching a profit on its EV business would be a major milestone, which have yet to make the kind of cash that hybrids and gasoline-powered cars make for traditional automakers, who are planning a shift to EVs in the years ahead. GM officials said Tuesday it believes its EV offerings will be even more profitable moving into 2025, despite the slowdown in growth of demand for EVs in its home market.
Meanwhile, Stellantis, which makes cars and trucks in North America under the Jeep, Ram, Dodge and Chrysler brands, said its European EV business was already profitable last year.
Last week Tesla, the world’s largest EV maker, reported that its adjusted earnings plunged 48% in the first quarter as revenue fell 9%, after it reported the first year-over-year drop in sales since the pandemic.
Meanwhile, Ford just reported a massive loss on every electric vehicle it sold. Ford’s electric vehicle unit reported that losses soared in the first quarter to $1.3 billion, or $132,000 for each of the 10,000 vehicles it sold in the first three months of the year, helping to drag down earnings for the company overall.
Ford, like most automakers, has announced plans to shift from traditional gas-powered vehicles to EVs in coming years. But it is the only traditional automaker to break out results of its retail EV sales. And the results it reported Wednesday show another sign of the profit pressures on the EV business at Ford and other automakers.
The EV unit, which Ford calls Model e, sold 10,000 vehicles in the quarter, down 20% from the number it sold a year earlier. And its revenue plunged 84% to about $100 million, which Ford attributed mostly to price cuts for EVs across the industry. That resulted in the $1.3 billion loss before interest and taxes (EBIT), and the massive per-vehicle loss in the Model e unit.
Is GM still drinking the Kool-aid that the central planners are selling. Is it about to turn the financial EV corner?
Or has Ford seen the supply/demand light of what is happening?
Which way will the EV wind blow?
4/30/