EVs Are Bleeding Cash; What’s Next for the Auto Industry?
I don’t mean to revel when I hear news stories that companies are losing billions on their bets on EVs. But, you know, it makes me feel a little bit better about being so wrong about Carvana stock. All right, we bring it up again. I got to go look and now I got to be safe. It’s 355 bucks a share. Oh my god. If I would CarMax, however, is losing share value. It’s uh Ethan said that uh it was one of the worst performing stocks of this year, down 46%. Ye year to date, 46.25 as of like 5:00 today or whenever I looked. Whereas Carvana is up like 78% year to date, which doesn’t make sense to me. Well, I I don’t know. I’m I’m sure there’s ways to explain it, but they’re almost direct competitors. So the fact that two people in the same industry in the same niche of the industry can be so opposite um you know unless CarMax is just running their business terribly uh or Carvana’s numbers are not accurate. Who knows? Anyway, GM loses 1.6 billion on EVs. That is a staggering amount of money. staggering amount of money. And this coming from the CEO, who’s still the CEO, Mary Barah, who back in 2017 uh made some statements saying, “We are basically allin on EVs and this is the future.” They she was committed. Uh here’s her quote from 2017 thanks to NBC News. No more gas, no more diesel, no more carbon emissions. Bold. Yes. Uh, another quote from an analyst at Morning Star says, “Penetration has stalled.” Well, you never want to hear that, Doug. Yeah. Well, uh, GM is struggling with sluggish sales on EVs due in part to the Trump administration’s elimination of the $7,500 tax credit for purchasers of EVs. And I think the industry in general is struggling. I think the that the Trump administration’s change, you know, obviously doesn’t help anything, but the adoption rate has been slowing pretty significantly. And you know, a lot of companies are looking at, you know, maybe the targets that have been set are not attainable. Correct. Yep. We’ve covered Porsche losing a lot of money and rolling back on some of their plans. And uh Ford also lost aboutund uh not 100, $1.5 billion in essentially canled future EVs. you know, the cost of development and stuff like that that then they said, “Eh, we’re not ready or, you know, we don’t think that the the demand is there.” Um, but the problem is this doesn’t just hurt the companies that make the bad bet. These are publicly traded companies. This hurts the shareholders. This hurts the average person who has a stake in this company. It hurts the employees. Um, yeah, because you know who know are the jobs that people got hired for in developing some of this stuff still going to be relevant? Is it the same people that would develop an ICE vehicle as would develop an EV? Are they going to need to find new jobs now? It’s like a lot of this stuff, it’s a big shakeup that does affect a there’s a ripple that affects a lot of people. Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, and just like you know their uh employee compensation, their their stock packages, whatever, they’re worth a lot less when the company’s losing money. Yes, the company can’t afford to hand out bonuses and give raises and stuff like well I guess they’re union so it doesn’t matter. They just negotiate contracts. But regardless, um the interesting thing is though, so we’ve talked about EVs a lot and the counter is that or the counterargument is, oh well, they’re gaining market share. They’re gaining market share, record sales, record sales, record sales. And that’s been true until now because you can only gain market share for so long. And when it’s, in my opinion, artificially propped up by these massive buying incentives, the manufacturers are claiming that, oh well, it’s the Trump administration’s fault. They they changed their policy. They removed all these incentives. Okay. Right. So, they just made a level playing field. I don’t get $7,500 back when I go buy a used car. Nobody gets $7,500 back when they go buy a new internal combustion car. So, if the EVs have to compete on the same level as everything else, let’s see how they do. That’s what I’ve been advocating for the whole time is not no EVs. It’s just let’s see how they do when they’re put up against real competition. Um, and hopefully enforce the the, you know, the innovation that can come from needing to be competitive in the market. you know, the the positive aspects of the e economic system that we live in, hopefully positive that can drive to a better product that is better for the the purchasers and then has the benefit of being better potentially hopefully better for the environment as well. I just think that verdict’s out on that one for me. I I I don’t want to get into that argument. We’re talking about numbers potentially. Yes. Yeah. The the overall footprint, not just the the tailpipe emissions. Yes. Um, the funny thing is though, although EV sales globally are down slightly year-to- date from last year, September was a record 2.1 million sales. It was the first time global EV sales had everclipsed 2 million. So, what happened? Well, it’s because these credits are ending. Uh oh. It’s like the the uh the GM employee pricing back in 2008 or whatever it was. Yeah. Everybody’s going to run out and buy. They’re going to break all sorts of records. And then the salesman better bank some money because they’ve just created a lot of rainy days cuz ain’t nobody buying a car the month after the employee pricing for everybody ends or cash for clunkers or whatever. So essentially everybody’s running out to buy before these these incentives expire and then it is projected by the experts not just me that I’m not saying that I am an expert I’m saying it’s not just projected by me the you know guy with a opinion on the internet but the real experts who have degrees and finance titles and stuff and get quoted in articles they are saying that the sales are going to essentially fall off a cliff after September, which is I mean, and it happened a little bit with the the panic buying pre uh tariff earlier this year. Um I have someone close to me that works in a you know main uh like a like a pretty popular brands dealer and things are so slow right now. And it’s not just because you know there is you know maybe some struggle in the economy. It’s like everybody bought cars like 3 or 4 months ago, whenever that was, when everybody was scared at the tariff increases. You used up all of the demand for a few months. You know, if you were thinking about buying a car later this year, well, just do it now before it’s more expensive. And it takes a while for the market to recover from such a a shock. Correct. Everybody’s sleepy. They’ve already spent the money. Correct. But GM and Ford are not the only ones that are reeling from this. Not just Porsche. Tesla is also struggling. Their sales are down, especially their Cybert trucks. And I read an interesting Well, no surprise there. They’re faking ugly and they’re 100 grand. Uh this uh article from electric.co uh called out that hundreds of Tesla Tesla Cybert trucks have been spotted being delivered to Elon Musk’s private companies SpaceX and XAI. and they quote that it’s because Tesla is having issues selling the electric pickup truck. Um they said after planning for production capacity of over a quarter million units per year, Tesla is currently selling the pickup truck at a rate of 20,000 units annually. Some number Rivian would be jealous of. I know. Oh god, I can’t believe they’re still selling that many. Uh yeah. So, they’re basically saying, well, Elon Musk has this solution. He’s going to have his private companies buy up hundreds, if not thousands of Cybert trucks, as this article says. And I’m reading this going, okay, yeah, uh, no surprise at all that Cybert trucks are selling or not selling, but it’s not like some secret, you know, machinations for Elon Musk to sell his Cybert trucks to other of his companies to prop up his share price. That’s just smart business. It’s what was it the Carnegie principle of of horizontal integration. Vertical vertical integr. He did both. Okay, thank you. Vertical integration. But why would you not do business with your own companies verse like why would you buy a bunch of Chevy trucks when you can buy your own trucks? For sure. I do think it’s funny that this is happening when it’s selling like hot garbo which is you know but I agree. You know, if you make sense to wait until the demand has waned. Yeah. You know, maybe they had trucks that they weren’t really aged out of service yet. I’ll be interested to see how quickly these age out of service. Well, they can service them because they are Tesla. So, anyway, I just I I with every news article, you got to understand the perspective, the bent, and there’s two ways to look at things. And I just I thought that was interesting. Yes, cyber trucks are failing, but why would why would you not do business with yourself versus giving money to another company? If you have the trucks, you sell them to your companies. I was makes sense to me. It’s good marketing, too. Yeah. See a bunch of your crappy cyber trucks everywhere. You might find the like one or two people who haven’t seen it yet and think it’s good looking, especially at a space company. Yeah. Yeah. It Yeah. Looks like something a a space martian would design if they were seven years old and not very intelligent. This brings us to the props and flops brought to you by Switchcars. And Switchcars is the enthusiast dealership where we buy and sell cars that we like ourselves. Check out our handpicked inventory at switchcars.com and mention Switchcast for special pricing when available. Find more information online at switchcars.com or come visit our indoor showroom in Twinsburg, Ohio. Doug, I think you know what the pick of the week is or I swear to God I quit. I’m out of here. Tyler, why don’t you tell us what the pick of the week is cuz you know more about it than I do. Beautiful 2003 Porsche 911 Carrera in dark teal metallic over a graphite gray full leather with 109,000 miles on it. serviced to the nines. Couple of cosmetic bits and bobs here. It has 109,000 mi on it, but it has been fantastic for me for the last 8 years, and I hope it can be fantastic for one of you. And thank you, Tyler. Dark teal. It is dark teal. Pretty cool. It’s got the cool multi-spoke. Oh, the Yeah, the Sport Classic twos that are a pain in the bum to clean, but they look so good. They look so good. All right, our flop of the week courtesy of roadandtrack.com. Uh Kia Telluride irony. A Kia Telluride gets a a tourist driving one gets stuck on a trail near Telleluride, Colorado. Amazing. This looks so depressing, too. Like it just kind of slipped off the road a little bit. It’s like oops. At least it didn’t fall further. I guess that, you know, thankfully it didn’t fall further, but it looks a little silly. I think it’s a rental, too, because it said it’s a South Carolina man and the plate is a Colorado plate. So, this guy went to Colorado, rented a TellRide, and was like, I’m going to be an off-roader. But, uh, yeah, he went off a trail on Black Bear Pass. Um, they said it’s a trail that’s best navigated on foot or with a dedicated off-road vehicle. And people had advised him to stay off the trail, but he did not heed their instructions and uh it was closed for about a day while they uh extricated the Telluride from Telluride. I like this done at the end of the article. Perhaps the driver should pay more attention to the fine print shown at the bottom of the screen on Kia Tellide commercials, particularly the part that says, “A professional driver on a closed course, do not attempt.” Yeah, he ain’t getting his security deposit back. Yep. Our prop of the week, Jay Roberts and Jake Dwinell set the roundabout record or the rotary record if you’re from New England. Has nothing to do with uh vehicles that burn a lot of oil. Uh this is uh five hours and 38 minutes I think it was uh continuously circling a roundabout which beat the previous record held by any NASCAR race. Yep. Uh they literally drove in a roundabout continuously. There’s rules to this of course. There’s a maximum of one minute stop for driver changes. Uh they held their bladders the entire time. They did get accosted by police twice. So here we are on the world record attempt for driving on a roundabout non-stop. The police have come. The police have gone and Jay is still going round. Once they stopped in the middle of the roundabout because if they left the roundabout that would be, you know, it would be over. Uh the other time another person kind of distracted the cop and and engaged them in conversation and said, “Here’s what they’re doing. It’s for charity, whatever.” And so the cop ended up just like watching the whole thing and laughing. Um yeah, they live streamed the whole thing, which uh would have been interesting, but you know, they tried to have good conversation, but they just kept talking in circles. Oh, hey. Yeah. Yeah. I there is there’s so much wrong with this whole thing though. There really is. I I mean there’s there’s nothing right about it. Unless you’re in England and then it’s all right. Ethan, pull the plug. Get us out of here. Get us out of You know, there’s a saying that applies to NASCAR and also applies here. Four lefts don’t make a right. Yeah, I like the first one. He He kept going with it and I I don’t know. Anyway, congratulations. We think to them that’s it’s a very obscure random record, but they had fun. They raised some money. Good good money for a good charity, Brock Gates Memorial Fund, and I guess didn’t get dizzy, which is amazing. I throw up after five laps. I know. Just like, oh, I mean, I don’t know how fast they’re going, but still. 12 miles an hour, I think, was their average speed for the whole thing. Boy, howdy. It really is incredible. But I mean, it has to be the most boring live stream of all time. I know. It’s like, “Yep, that car is still going around.” I don’t think it’s incredible. I think it’s just a thing. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it’s awesome. Like, you have the record for the most time in a roundabout. That’s awesome. And the charity component is sweet. Like that. That’s fantastic. And And we love Jay. Like, more power to him. Ridiculous. Absolutely. This was a halfhour drive, by the way. here to watch a Prius go in circles. But holy smokes, I pulled up, we were at that bonfire and I pulled up the live stream and it’s just like guys in a car. Like that’s it. Just guys in a car. It’s like a prop and flop at the same time. If you if you actually tuned into that live stream and you stuck around for more than Doug, you and I maybe watched it for 15 seconds combined. I don’t even remember watching. I thought it was a photo. The Sheffield brand was recently revived by Jay Turpus, an owner of an original Sheffield Allport diver he received from his parents in 1970 when he was just 11, beginning his love of watches. As an adult, Jay used his extensive expertise in product development and marketing to revive the brand that started it all. He set out to develop watches with a high level of quality and specification at a value price. His first effort and a successful one on July of 2023 was the debut of the Sheffield All Sport Diver 1. It had the kind of build and movement that much more expensive watches use, and his debut price of $18 was equivalent to the $13 his parents paid in 1970. Since that debut, Sheffield has expanded to a wider range of automatics and chronos, many designed around vintage Sheffield dials of the60s. The Sheffield well of clever and unique design remains his inspiration as well as maintaining the goal of highquality, very affordable range of automatic and quartz watches. Sheffield Watches value on merit, not just price. I love mine, so get yours at cheffieldwatches.com and be sure to mention you found them on Switchcast. Thank you for joining us for Switchcast with Doug Tabet and Tyler Sanders, produced by Ethan Huffagel. Switchcast is an automotive entertainment and opinion show and nothing we say should be taken very seriously. We do not give tax, investment, legal, emotional or professional advice and the only licenses we hold are driver’s licenses. The opinions expressed on this show are exclusively held by the people pontificating at that moment and do not reflect the values of our producers or sponsors. Our theme music is provided by Emily and Ivory. You can stream their full album on Spotify or Soundcloud. If you like this show, you can stream it in its entirety on your favorite audio podcast platform. Check out switchcast.live for more info. [Music]
The future of EVs is bleak and automakers are starting to backpedal a bit.
Stream the full episode:
Support us on Patreon for bonus, exclusive content + live stream access https://www.patreon.com/switchcast
For more information on SwitchCast & to submit vanity plates, check out our website: https://switchcast.live/
Articles referenced in this video:
https://www.nbcnews.com/business/autos/electric-vehicle-ev-slowdown-rcna237652
https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/global-ev-sales-hit-record-21-million-september-research-firm-says-2025-10-14/
Elon Musk’s SpaceX and xAI are buying Tesla’s unsold Cybertrucks
Flop of the week:
https://www.roadandtrack.com/news/a68849922/kia-telluride-off-road-stuck-telluride-colorado/
Please visit our sponsors:
https://www.soexinc.com/ – A truly reputable auto transport company
https://sheffieldwatches.com/ – mention “SWITCHCAST”
https://www.nuts4sticks.com/ – discount code “SWITCHCAST” for 10% discount
https://epicvin.com/?a_aid=vvttz3hc9ogvd- the supplemental vehicle history reports you really need. Use our affiliate link!
https://solonspine.com/ – Are you crooked? Solon Spine will straighten you out!
Follow our socials:
https://www.facebook.com/SwitchcarsInc
@switchcarsdoug
https://www.instagram.com/switchcars
#switchcars #switchcast #porschegt3 #electricvehicles
