Ford January 2023 sales boosted by F-Series and Bronco

Ford staff deliver the electric powered F-150 Lightning pickup on Dec. 13, 2022 at the automaker’s Ford Rouge Electric Automobile Centre (REVC).

Michael Wayland | CNBC

DETROIT — Ford Motor‘s new U.S. vehicle profits started off 2023 on a much better footing than a calendar year previously but ended up down 18.4% from December, the enterprise documented Thursday.

January is traditionally 1 of the weakest months of the yr, whilst December is 1 of the strongest. Still, the month-about-month decline is noteworthy as the worst for the automaker considering the fact that a 28% drop in between Could and June of past 12 months. Involving December 2021 and January 2022, revenue declined 17.4%.

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The automotive business continues to navigate by way of some offer chain and manufacturing troubles, despite the fact that the move of areas and motor vehicle output this 12 months is expected to be additional consistent than in recent yrs. Morgan Stanley said Thursday that U.S. vehicle product sales last thirty day period smashed expectations: It believed the seasonally altered promoting amount at 16.2 million in contrast with expectations of 15.5 million.

For January, Ford claimed a 2% enhance in product sales from a 12 months earlier to 146,356 cars offered. The uptick was led by profits increases of 8.8% for F-Series pickups, 25.5% for Broncos, and 52% for Bronco Activity SUVs — as well as a doubling of its electric motor vehicle product sales, which have been and stay negligible. EVs produced up 3.6% of Ford’s month-to-month income.

Some of the automaker’s crossovers this kind of as the Ford Edge and Escape experienced double-digit declines from a 12 months before.

Inventory comparison in between Ford, Standard Motors and Tesla.

“We are pleased with the sturdy income start to the calendar year with our gains getting pushed by report electric powered motor vehicle sales, F-Collection vehicles and Broncos,” Ford spokesman Mentioned Depp claimed in an electronic mail to CNBC.

Ford’s EV product sales — a big concentration of Wall Road — improved to 5,247 units in January, led by a roughly 11% enhance in revenue of its electric Mustang Mach-E crossover. The automaker sold 2,264 units of its electrical F-150 Lightning pickup in January.

On Monday, Ford declared it was raising manufacturing and reducing rates of the Mach-E, months soon after field leader Tesla introduced identical strategies for its EVs.

The Mach-E led Ford to come to be the next-bestselling automaker of EVs very last 12 months in the U.S., albeit trailing Tesla by a vast margin. Ford sold a lot more than 65,000 EVs in the U.S. very last calendar year. Motor Intelligence estimates Tesla, which does not report product sales by location, sold a lot more than 522,000 EVs in the U.S. in 2022.

Ford’s January sales come forward of the automaker releasing fourth-quarter and 2022 earnings success Thursday soon after markets shut. In Oct, Ford verified its prior comprehensive-12 months steering of altered earnings before fascination and taxes of among $11.5 billion and $12.5 billion.

— CNBC’s Michael Bloom contributed to this report.