{"id":184644,"date":"2025-10-02T09:19:08","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T09:19:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/184644\/"},"modified":"2025-10-02T09:19:08","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T09:19:08","slug":"fords-ceo-issues-a-stark-warning-for-americas-ev-industry","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/184644\/","title":{"rendered":"Ford’s CEO Issues A Stark Warning For America’s EV Industry"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s the first of October, which means the electric-vehicle tax credit is officially dead, having passed away in the wee hours of the morning. Speaking of \u201cmorning\u201d, we, and more than a few auto companies, are mourning its death.<\/a><\/p>\n

It’s no secret that the EV tax credit was a boon to the industry. That $7,500 credit helped a lot of buyers afford EVs, whether it was via a purchase incentive done right at the point of sale or placed into a lease.\u00a0 We’re already starting to understand the fallout of what this will mean for the EV industry as a whole. And the chief of one big American automaker says it’s already putting a damper on his plans.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n

Welcome back to Critical Materials<\/a>, your one-stop shop for the biggest news in the EV world. Today, we\u2019re focusing on early reactions to the EV tax credit\u2019s impact, and what it will mean for consumers now that it\u2019s dead.\u00a0Let\u2019s hop right in, folks.<\/p>\n

30%: Ford Says Expect EV Market To Halve<\/p>\n

\"2026<\/p>\n

Photo by: Ford<\/p>\n

Man, EV companies can\u2019t catch a break, huh? For a long time, the U.S. EV market was heavily reliant on Tesla for a lot of reasons; the cars themselves were kind of the only game in town that was worth a damn to the average consumer.<\/p>\n

Range, price and general usability hit all of the sweet spots with consumers, especially with the (relatively) reasonably priced Model 3 and Model Y. Add in the tax credit, and things were good for Tesla.<\/p>\n

And now that other automakers are finally starting to catch up, they\u2019ve been cut off at the knees. The tax credit was a large incentive for American car buyers, and now it’s gone. According to reporting from Fortune,<\/a>\u00a0Ford CEO Jim Farley said that the death of the EV tax credit could cut the industry in half:\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ford CEO Jim Farley, speaking at the Ford Pro Accelerate summit in Detroit on Tuesday, said he sees a huge impact from the policy change.<\/p>\n

While he still sees EVs being a \u201cvibrant industry\u201d going forward, it\u2019s also \u201cgoing to be smaller, way smaller than we thought.\u201d He called the end of the $7,500 consumer incentive a game-changer and said he wouldn\u2019t be surprised if EV sales in the U.S. go down to 5% of the industry from the current level of roughly 10% to 12%. The most recent forecast from J.D. Power and GlobalData estimated that EVs would account for 12.2% of new-vehicle sales in September 2025.<\/p>\n

Farley reminded the audience that he always says, \u201cThe customers are pesky. They surprise you.\u201d And what he\u2019s learned is that \u201ccustomers are not interested in a $75,000 electric vehicle. They find them interesting. They\u2019re fast. They\u2019re efficient. You don\u2019t go to the gas station. But they\u2019re expensive.\u201d<\/p>\n

This feels like a complete no-brainer. Until relatively recently, EV efforts from most companies that aren\u2019t Tesla have been aimed at the upper-class buyer. And a $75,000 car, no matter if it\u2019s electric or not, is a hard sell in today\u2019s world, where buyers feel incredibly squeezed by an increased cost of living.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Ford is leaning into cheaper offerings. It’s\u00a0on the brink of introducing a $30,000 EV truck<\/a>, built on a brand-new platform using a reinvented version of the assembly line.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Fortune said that Farley still sees electrification in general as the way forward for the U.S. market, even if that future leans more on hybrids than pure EVs.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u201cPartial electrification is more interesting to customers than we thought\u2026we think hybrid, EV plug-in, E-revs, those kind of partial electric solutions, America is going to fall in love with, or already is falling in love with.\u201d And they\u2019re falling out of love with pure-play EVs, he implied.<\/p>\n

The end of the tax credit isn’t great news for the EV market, not to mention the supply chain that has been building up to support what everyone thought would be a boom time in American auto manufacturing. The world will continue to go electric, so let\u2019s hope this is temporary.<\/p>\n

60%: Tesla Has Already Updated Its Lease Pricing<\/p>\n

\"2026<\/p>\n

Photo by: Patrick George<\/p>\n

While automakers and local dealerships are scrambling to update their incentives and sales pricing, there\u2019s no slacking at Tesla. Initially spotted by Reuters <\/a>and confirmed by us, Tesla has already changed its lease pricing on its new EV models:\u00a0<\/p>\n

Tesla and its rivals had been passing these credits on to customers through competitive lease offers.<\/p>\n

The monthly lease of the electric vehicle manufacturer’s best-selling Model Y increased to a range between $529 and $599, from a range of $479 to $529. Prices of all vehicles, however, remain unchanged. Model 3 lease prices touched a range of $429 to $759 per month, from a range of $349 to $699.<\/p>\n

Demand for battery-powered models is already showing signs of a slowdown after rapid growth earlier in the decade. Sales could drop after the credits dry up, auto executives and analysts have warned.<\/p>\n

These prices don\u2019t seem like too much of a stretch. A jump from $349 to $429 for the Tesla Model 3 isn\u2019t insignificant, especially for buyers on a budget, but this still feels competitive with similarly priced premium internal-combustion sedans.<\/p>\n

Purchase prices for the cars haven\u2019t changed.<\/p>\n

90%: Tax Credit Claims Weren\u2019t Always Lease-Only<\/p>\n

\"2024<\/p>\n

Photo by: Mack Hogan\/InsideEVs<\/p>\n

The EV tax credit really helped with leasing<\/a>\u00a0in particular. Not long ago, before the credit died entirely, new legislation reconfigured the policy so it would only apply to new purchases of cars made in North America.<\/p>\n

But those restrictions didn\u2019t apply to vehicles owned by commercial entities, creating a clever loophole for leases. Leasing companies could claim the credit and pass it on to lessees, bringing down the initial cost and monthly payment. Thus, you’d\u00a0think that most, if not all, EV purchases would be leased, right?<\/p>\n

Well, no. According to data from Experian (and reported on by Automotive News<\/a>), the popularity of leasing depended heavily on which electric model you’re talking about:<\/p>\n

The Tesla Model Y was the top-selling electric vehicle in the second quarter of 2025 but only 30 percent of those sales were for leases, according to Experian. About half of all Model Y customers financed their purchase with a loan.<\/p>\n

In contrast, the Chevrolet Equinox EV was the third-most-popular EV in the quarter, and 60 percent of those purchases were leases.<\/p>\n

Other models quoted, like the Model 3, Hyundai Ioniq 5, and Ford Mustang Mach-E, hovered around a 60%-ish lease rate. And in some ways this makes sense: The Model Y, for example, qualified for a credit when purchased, while the Mach-E didn’t.<\/p>\n

Interestingly, Automotive News says that on average, EV leases were $175 cheaper per month than EV loans.\u00a0<\/p>\n

100%: Is The Death Of The EV Tax Credit Overblown?<\/p>\n

\"Slate<\/p>\n

Photo by: Kevin Williams\/InsideEVs<\/p>\n

The federal incentives to both buy and build zero-emission cars<\/a> are mostly gone for now, but the U.S. hasn’t quite reached price parity en masse for EVs and combustion cars. It seems like we were getting close, but the little bit of assistance to get us over the line is now totally gone.\u00a0<\/p>\n

And yet the world continues to electrify. I\u2019m not going to assert that the tax credit did nothing. But in a world where people shop for cars primarily based on their monthly payments, did those deals help as much as, say, a cheaper EV in general?\u00a0<\/p>\n

Cars like the new Nissan Leaf<\/a>, Slate\u2019s truck<\/a> or Ford\u2019s upcoming pickup<\/a> may be a test of how much the tax credit actually helped.<\/p>\n

What do you think? Let us know in the comments.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"It\u2019s the first of October, which means the electric-vehicle tax credit is officially dead, having passed away in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":184645,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[45,49,48,92967,10221],"class_list":["post-184644","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-business","tag-business","tag-ca","tag-canada","tag-critical-materials","tag-ford"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184644","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=184644"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/184644\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/184645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=184644"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=184644"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=184644"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}