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Even Falcon would have been better. Futura reminded me.
My son is hoping they make a “street truck”. Whatever that means to him. February we will go to the Chicago Auto Show so he can look around. He loves his Elantra N just wishes it was smaller. He would prefer a hot hatch or if he’s gonna have something big, street truck. The Elantra was his first sedan and he now realizes he’s not a sedan person.
 
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This oft-repeated myth of "losing money on every vehicle sold" is furthering an accounting lie.

They invested a bunch of money and accounted for that investment in a way they could have the taxpayer cover their investment bill. Then they spread the myth that they were losing money on every vehicle sold so they could write off a big chunk of R&D that they got to keep. A write-off like that should come with a release to the public domain all of the IP they are asking the public to foot the bill for. No tax write-off without a benefit to the taxpayer.

They didn't lose money on every vehicle they sold. They recovered a portion of their investment on every vehicle sold.

When they cancelled the vehicle is when they stopped recovering their investment and their investment became realized losses. They lost money on every vehicle they refused to sell.

They could have tried to sell enough to make back their investment. But they didn't bother. And so they will continue to make this silly claim. And the automotive press will continue to love that narrative so will fail to challenge them on it.

This will be true for the Fathom too. The "loss" on the first vehicle sold will be $5B or whatever amount they have spent on their new EV program (less $2k or whatever the vehicle sells for over the direct, fixed manufacturing, labor, shipping, advertising, etc costs). The second sale will reduce the "losses" per vehicle from $5B to $2.5B (less 2*$2k). The 10,000th sale will reduce the "losses" to $5B/10,000 or a "loss" of $500,000/vehicle sold...
I didn’t realize you were an accountant too 😀. This is the approach my wife takes trying to educate people as none of us are properly prepared in K-12th grade. Once you see it the other way your whole outlook changes
 
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I didn’t realize you were an accountant too 😀. This is the approach my wife takes trying to educate people as none of us are properly prepared in K-12th grade. Once you see it the other way your whole outlook changes

I did my business accounting for five years before I ran out of time and hired an accountant to take over. I'm happy to let it go.
 
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Not news per-se, but we fast charged at an Electrify America at like 10AM earlier this week and the "congestion" rate, even though nobody else was there charging, was $.68 a kWh. Just to put that in perspective, at $5.50/gal of regular (SF Bay Area so yeah its expensive), this is like filling up a gas car that gets 24mpg....think Toyota Highlander V6 AWD. Even worse, our home energy costs is $.40 kWh which means it's equivalent to a car getting 41mpg so Rav4 Hybrid.

I guess the news here for us is that going electric is, at today's energy rates, not as cheap as it once was.
 
Not news per-se, but we fast charged at an Electrify America at like 10AM earlier this week and the "congestion" rate, even though nobody else was there charging, was $.68 a kWh. Just to put that in perspective, at $5.50/gal of regular (SF Bay Area so yeah its expensive), this is like filling up a gas car that gets 24mpg....think Toyota Highlander V6 AWD. Even worse, our home energy costs is $.40 kWh which means it's equivalent to a car getting 41mpg so Rav4 Hybrid.

I guess the news here for us is that going electric is, at today's energy rates, not as cheap as it once was.
Can you not do a TOU rate or something? When we lived in NorCal (PG&E) they have a TOU rate that made power quite expensive during the day (but we were mostly at work so didn't matter) and then made the overnight rate much cheaper.

Even here in OK we have a TOU rate that May-October that has peak rate 14:00-19:00 M-F and cheap all other times. I don't have a bill handy but off peak with taxes and everything was $0.13/kWh and on peak was $0.36/kWh. They also have a specific EV rate but that would actually cost us more than the TOU rate. May be worth digging into your power company's website and rate tariffs.
 
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New Dodge color.

IMG_2155.png
 
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Retired accountant chiming in. Heard a joke that was on point...

A lawyer, engineer, and an accountant are talking at a bar. The bar owner asks them what is 2+2. The lawyer says he will need to research the legal precedents and leaves (not like you are going to get a lawyer to answer a question for free I guess). The engineer says he will need to look it up in his tables. The accountant asks - what do you want it to equal?

While it might not be quite that bad - there are multiple accounting methods used, and multiple definitions that could be described as or confused with "loss". Are we talking accounting loss, are we talking negative cash flow, are we actually dealing with a negative margin per vehicle.

Ford spent a lot of money on R&D, it has to be expended to determine "loss". Ford spent a lot of money on a large new factory - which has to be depreciated. While the IRS has its rules, businesses can use various different methods that more accurately reflect the true economic situation for themselves. But those expenses are in the past, they don't effect current cash flow. Then we have to look at fixed and variable costs associated with production. You have to maintain the factory - while some of that maintenance is consumables that vary with production, some is just required to prevent decay regardless of production rate. While variable costs are directly associated with production, even they can change with production rate. Economies of scale exist, but they also have sweat points. Too much production can hurt as much as too little.

Few companies produce products that have a negative margin unless there are underlying reasons (other than terrible decision making-which honestly I think Ford was guilty of). I don't know if Ford was producing vehicles with a negative margin (which is when proceeds are less than variable costs). I doubt it, but automotive manufacturers do have reasons. Political (to maintain cafe standards across the entire line), and secondary income sources (they make money off repairs and maintenance, they also make money of of financing). Ford Motor Credit is not a small business. Then you still have not addressed adoption rates - they could easily get vehicles on the road at a negative margin, with the expectation they will spur future profitable sales (my crystal ball is usually hazy, but marketing often just sees sunny days ahead).

From a tax perspective - what Ford did may be entirely rational. The Goverment reasons to produce the EV largely went away. I think cafe standards have largely been pushed back. Goverment incentives have also largely gone away. Adoption rates did not hit projections. But by killing the line, they will probably be able to write off some of the R&D and possibly even depreciation rather than just expense it over time. There may be definite cash flow issues that make stopping now, and resurrecting later economically preferable (especially if adoption rates increase).