With Ford announcing Q1 2022 results, the numbers are now official, Tesla is now the most profitable US car maker.
During the first quarter of this year, Tesla reported a net income of $3.31 billion, representing a year-over-year increase of 658%. By comparison, GM posted a net profit of $2.93 billion in the first quarter, a 3.04% year-over-year decrease. Ford, despite the success of vehicles like the Mustang Mach-E and the strength of its F-Series, posted a net loss of $3.1 billion in Q1 2022, partly due to its investment in electric truck maker Rivian.
Tesla delivered 310,048 cars in Q1 2022, which is far behind Ford’s 970,000 and GM’s 1.427 million. Despite delivering less cars, Tesla still made way more money than its more experienced Detroit-based rivals.
Tesla accomplished this by having much higher margins on their cars, lower cost of manufacturing with state of the art gigafactories, no dealer network taking away profit, and spending zero on advertising. As a result, Tesla has the highest gross profit margin per car in the industry.
When you can beat a competitor who sold over 1 million cars more than you, you’re doing something right.
Disclaimer: I am long TSLA.