The EV ‘Bloodbath’ Arrives Early EVs are becoming the red shirts of the automotive world DAVID BLACKMON
Donald Trump predicted Joe Biden’s efforts to force Americans to convert their lives to electric vehicle (EV) lifestyles would end in a “bloodbath” for the US auto industry….
The EV ‘Bloodbath’ Arrives Early
EVs arthe red shirts of the automotive world
APR 27
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PAID
Ever since March 16, when US presidential candidate Donald Trump created a controversy by predicting Joe Biden’s efforts to force Americans to convert their lives to electric vehicle (EV) lifestyles would end in a “bloodbath” for the US auto industry, the industry’s own disastrous results have consistently proven him accurate.
The latest example came this week when Ford Motor Company reported that it had somehow managed to lose $132,000 per unit sold during Q1 2024 in its Model e EV division. The disastrous first quarter results follow the equally disastrous results for 2023, when the company said it lost $4.7 billion in Model e for the full 12-month period.
While the company has remained profitable overall thanks to strong demand for its legacy internal combustion SUV, pickup, and heavy vehicle models, the string of major losses in its EV line led the company to announce a shift in strategic vision in early April. Ford CEO Jim Farley said then that the company would delay the introduction of additional planned all-electric models and scale back production of current models like the F-150 Lightning pickup while refocusing efforts on introducing new hybrid models across its business line.
GM reported it had good overall Q1 results, but they were based on strong sales of its gas-powered SUV and truck models, not its EVs. GM is so gun-shy about reporting EV-specific results that it doesn’t break them out in its quarterly reports, so there is no way of knowing what the real bottom line amounts to from that part of the business. This is possibly a practice Ford should consider adopting.
After reporting its own disappointing Q1 results in which adjusted earnings collapsed by 48% and deliveries dropped by 20% from the previous quarter, Tesla announced it is laying off 10 percent of its global workforce, including 2,700 employees at its Austin plant, where its vaunted Cybertruck is manufactured. Since its introduction in November, the Cybertruck has been beset by buyer complaints ranging from breakdowns within minutes after taking delivery, to its $3,000 camping tent feature failing to deploy, to an incident in which one buyer complained his vehicle shut down for 5 hours after he failed to put the truck in “carwash mode” before running it through a local car wash.
Meanwhile, international auto rental company Hertz is now fire sellingits own fleet of Teslas and other EV models in its efforts to salvage a little final value from what is turning out to be a disastrous EV gamble. In a giant fit of green virtue-signaling, the company invested whole hog into the Biden subsidy program in 2021 with a mass purchase of as many as 100,000 Teslas and 50,000 Polestar models, only to find that customer demand for renting electric cars was as tepid as demand to buy them outright. For its troubles, Hertz reported it had lost $392 million during Q1, attributing $195 million of the loss to its EV struggles. Hertz’s share price plummeted by about 20% on April 25, and was down by 55% for the year.
If all this financial carnage does not yet constitute a “bloodbath” for the US EV sector, it is difficult to imagine what would. But wait: It really isn’t all that hard to imagine at all, is it? When he used that term back in March, Mr. Trump was referring not just to the ruinous Biden subsidy program, but also to plans by China to establish an EV-manufacturing beachhead in Mexico, from which it would be able to flood the US market with its cheap but high-quality electric models. That would definitely cause an already disastrous domestic EV market to get even worse, wouldn’t it?
The bottom line here is that it is becoming obvious even to ardent EV fans that US consumer demand for EVs has reached a peak long before the industry and government expected it would. It’s a bit of a perfect storm, one that rent-seeking company executives and obliging policymakers brought upon themselves. Given that this outcome was highly predictable, with so many warning it was in fact inevitable, a reckoning from investors and corporate boards and voters will soon come due. It could become a bloodbath of its own, and perhaps it should.
Here is my post today from Substack: From Democracy to Democrazy, by Graham.
This SCOTUS decision should be simple. Allowing a President - or a candidate for the presidency - to break the laws that govern our nation, enables a dictatorship.
The plague that has besieged our democratic nation has come from the eastern direction - namely Russia. Anyone who thinks that Trump and his criminal buddies like Guiliani are smart enough to create this infectious and alien species of Republicans is not living in real time. What we are seeing happening in our country is a destructive and invasive plan carefully assembled by Russia.
No, I am not delusional. I spent 12 years studying Russia including learning Russian, then the next 20 years off and on living in Russia and Russian-speaking countries. I wrote From Democracy to Democrazy as a warning to all Americans. Yes, the Russians are coming and 95% of Americans are not cognizant of Trump's linkage and affinity to Russia. This is because the Mueller Report sorely failed - but that is another day's discussion.
Donald Trump is not smart. The Washington Post 2020 poll asked Americans "Do you think Trump has the mental sharpness it takes to serve effectively as president? Fifty-two percent of the respondents said no." "The 2017 Washington Post-ABC News poll asked people an open-ended question: What one word best describes Trump? The most common term to describe him was 'incompetent.' Other related characterizations included 'idiot,', 'ignorant,' and 'unqualified." The Quinnipiac poll asked the same question in 2017, and "by far, the most frequent word that came to mind was 'idiot', 'incompetent,' 'moron,' 'ignorant,' and 'stupid." The point is: Trump did not concoct the plan to defeat our democracy. He is simply a puppet used by Putin toward Russia's achievement.
In 1997, a book was published in Russia called The Foundations of Geopolitics. Putin was surmised to be the ghost writer since this book outlined his goals as the second President of Russia. This book includes the internal destruction of the United States - a plan that Putin has dreamed of since childhood when his target was to join the KGB. He first obtained a law degree, was accepted into the KGB, then spent his spy years in East Germany. There he perfected his bribery skills on West German men and foreigners. He returned to Russia and was picked by Yeltsin to be the next president. In a blink, he transformed the Russian government into a solid dictatorship assembling other KGB/FSB men and women to support his "holy grail" of restoring Russia to its glory days of world domination - by destroying NATO, demolishing the United States, and obliterating the sovereign nation of Ukraine. In the June 2022 NYT's article titled "Putin Denounces the U.S. as a Fading World Power." Putin has built upon the Soviet Union's foreign intelligence (KGB) with the new organization called the FSB and helped to establish their policies and procedures with far more strategic planning expertise. From the time of his inauguration in 2000, Putin's number one target has been the United States, using Trump's idiocy who has been following Putin's instructions to the tee.
Do you recall when Trump hosted Sergey Kislyak, the Russian Ambassador and Sergey Lavrov, the Minister of Russian Foreign Affairs in the White House Oval Office? No other American government officials were invited and there were no translators. Trump, a kompromised American stooge, was fallaciously "showing off" his new dog house and tricks to his owners/controllers.
In the end of Catherine Belton's book called Putin's People, she concludes: "The Russian black-cash seemed to be digging in ever deeper. Their activities, combined with Trump's disregard for the institutions and codes of the U.S. democracy, were leading to a systematic standoff. . . From the beginning, the Russian black-cash networks had, in part, been embedded to erode the American system, and exacerbate corruption in the West. . . In the impeachment probe and the 2020 U.S. Presidential race, the dash between the democratic values and a Putin-style corrupt authoritarian order was reaching a denouement. Putin understands that Russia can spend any amount of money it wishes on sowing chaos in the West." Pragmatically, Putin won this round with democracy.
The U.S. Senate - replicating the Russian DUMA - had been Trump's ace in a hole and prevented impeachment. They were reacting out of fear of reprisal from Trump and his violent followers just like the elected Russian DUMA reacts to the threat of Putin. Threats had been made on all Republican Senators. Afterward, Gonzales (R) of Ohio refused to run for re-election and hired 24-hour protection for his family. He was one of the ten Republicans who voted FOR impeachment. It is safe to say that Putin had already predicted this in advance and knew the full implications of preventing Trump's impeachment.
Belton goes on to say: "The Russian network and system of KGB capitalism has infiltrated the West - and it still operates twenty-four hours per day. It has penetrated our banks and financial institutions, our consumer supplies, our government's vital automated information systems, our health systems and hospitals, our gas, oil, and energy sources and probably every single aspect of American life." The plan for dismantling our democracy did not come from "stupid" Donald Trump. It came from Russia/Putin and has been in place for more than a quarter of a century.
SCOTUS has disgracefully attempted to analyze a President's right to break the law - the very laws that are the pillars of our democracy and they are obligated to safeguard. Because the majority of these judges were appointed by Trump, they are searching for barricades to protect HIM instead of our country.
The shadow cast by Putin over the landscape of American democracy, and his control over Trump is the destructive force we see happening NOW. Our democracy hangs in the balance and the tipping point may be the decision made today or tomorrow.
Elizabeth Graham
www.democrazy2020.org
I hope the entire China EV industry goes bust as a result !