Automotive industry Fire at major aluminum supplier slows Ford down
In addition to business hurdles, a fire at an important aluminum supplier has also caused problems for the US auto giant Ford. However, the impact of Donald Trump's import tariffs is expected to be less than anticipated.
24.10.2025, 02:09
SDA
The supply bottlenecks will result in a burden of 1.5 to 2 billion dollars, Ford announced when presenting its quarterly figures. However, production of the F-series pickups, which are popular in the USA, is to be increased by 50,000 vehicles in the coming year.
Trump's aggressive trade policy with new import tariffs depressed Group earnings before interest and taxes by 700 million dollars in the past quarter. Despite this burden, Ford clearly exceeded market expectations.
Turnover rose by nine percent to 50.5 billion dollars. On average, analysts had expected a good 43 billion dollars in sales in the car division - Ford achieved 47.2 billion. The quarterly profit jumped from 900 million dollars a year earlier to 2.4 billion dollars.
As the US government has softened the import duties for manufacturers producing in the USA, Ford is still expecting a burden of one billion dollars from the duties this year. The previous forecast was two billion dollars.
E-cars still in the red
The Group continues to lose a lot of money in the electric car business. In the past quarter, the division posted an operating loss of 1.4 billion dollars. In contrast, Ford earned 1.54 billion dollars from vehicles with combustion engines and just under two billion dollars from commercial vehicles.
Ford's aluminum supplier Novelis suffered a fire at a plant in the state of New York in September. Ford is now working with Novelis and other companies to close the supply gap where possible, it said. The carmaker had replaced steel with aluminum in many of its large vehicles in order to reduce weight and fuel consumption.
