In a deal between two rivals, Ford Motor Co. (NYSE: F) electric vehicles (EVs) will have access to Tesla Inc.’s (NASDAQ: TSLA) approximately 12,000 Supercharger stations. It is not entirely clear why Tesla’s Elon Musk would do this, but it is done. Perhaps he sees his lead over Ford in EV sales as so large that he does not care. Indeed, Wall Street has acknowledged the gulf in how it treated the two stocks this year. (These 20 cars have been completely redesigned for 2023.)
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Year to date, Ford’s shares are off about 1% and trade near their 52-week low. At the same time, Tesla’s are up by 72%. Ford’s market cap is $46 billion, while Tesla’s is $585 billion. The gulf is almost ridiculous.

Ford will be fortunate to sell 100,000 EVs in the United States this year. Tesla could sell just short of 2 million vehicles, although it is unclear how many are in the United States. Tesla also controls the industry’s pricing, which is evident as it has dropped the price of its vehicles to pick up market share. Ford’s CEO has admitted a price battle will cut into his EV margins. Just how large that cut will be depends to some extent on Tesla’s pricing.

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Ford recently made a presentation about its next generation of EVs. Investors ignored it. Ford has entered a “big hat, no cattle” phase of investor skepticism, which will not end until its EV sales skyrocket. Few people care if Ford claims its newer EVs will have better features.

It is hardly worth the time to run through Ford’s litany of problems with its EV flagship F-150 Lightning. Pricing trouble and production problems head the list, and that can only hurt the Ford EV brand. Car buyers read the papers.

Ultimately, Musk can be generous because he does not think generosity counts if Ford has too few EVs on the road for it to matter.

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