Several car manufacturers are currently reporting declining profits despite rising sales. The same is true for Ford, with the result for the past quarter even showing a loss.
Ford divides its products in the books into three categories. The “Model e segment” is the collective name for electric cars, ‘Ford Blue’ the collective name for (semi-)traditionally powered passenger cars, and ‘Ford Pro’ is responsible for commercial vehicles, including the wildly popular F-series pickups and the fairly popular Transit models in Europe.
Ford Blue is responsible for the vast majority of cars sold, but saw a slight sales decline of 6 percent in the past quarter. This is offset by sales increases in the other two divisions, albeit just barely. In total, Ford sold 4 percent more vehicles than in the same quarter last year.
However, the most important figure is the profit, because it is in brackets. Anyone who has ever studied such a financial report knows that this means a loss. Ford reports a loss of $36 million, about €31.5 million, but mainly attributes this to so-called “special items.” One-off events, such as investments in factories, restructuring, and other large, often unexpected expenses.
Ford, as an American and European company, is also greatly affected by trade tariffs back and forth. The loss also has negative consequences for the forecast for the entire year. Ford previously thought it would make a profit of 7 to 8.5 billion (EBIT), but this has now been adjusted to 6.5 to 7.5. In May, Ford already distanced itself from the earlier forecast due to uncertainties caused by the looming but not yet definitive import duties.