Lucid Motors (LCID) will release Q1 earnings after the bell on Monday, a crucial report for the pure-play electric vehicle maker looking to assuage investor concerns about production and profitability.
For the quarter, Lucid is expected to report top-line revenue of $1.29 billion, a massive gain from the $257 million it reported last quarter and an over 20-fold jump from $57.7 million it reported a year ago. In terms of profitability, Lucid is expected to report an adjusted EPS loss of $1.43, and adjusted net income of a loss of $2.53 billion.
The losses come as Lucid has seen its average transaction price fall through the end of the year. In the fourth quarter Lucid saw that metric drop to $133,000 from $160,000 in Q1 of 2022.
Further weighing on transaction prices, in Q1 Lucid announced its own $7,500 “credit” for certain Air sedans, as a way to boost sales when its sole product doesn’t qualify for the $7,500 federal EV tax credit. Management will likely address whether this incentive lifted pre-orders during the quarter and also any hit it may have taken on profitability. In mid-February Lucid said it had 28,000 pre-orders for the Air sedan (its only product for sale), but that figure dropped from 34,000 pre-orders it had in November.
On a production standpoint, in Q1 Lucid produced 2,314 vehicles, delivering only 1,406 of those cars to customers. Lucid will have to boost production to around 3,900 vehicles a quarter to hit its stretch goal of 14,000 units for the year.
Looking ahead, a big question that will likely be addressed on the earnings call is the future of the company’s ownership structure and its status as a public entity. Lucid’s stock shot up in January on speculation Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund (PIF) would buy out the remainder of the company it doesn’t own and take it private. PIF’s stake in Lucid sits at approximately 65%.
The Lucid/PIF partnership goes beyond a financial agreement; last year Lucid announced it will be building a factory in Saudi Arabia, with a planned annual capacity of 155,000 EVs a year.
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Pras Subramanian is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. You can follow him on Twitter and on Instagram.
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