Ford, GM report mixed commercial fleet results in Q1

Ford and General Motors saw mixed results in commercial vehicle demand during the first quarter, as Ford’s commercial vehicle segment experienced a slowdown while GM saw improved fleet sales. 

Ford Pro, the commercial fleet division of Ford, saw Q1 revenue of $15.2 billion, down 15.8% year over year, according to Ford’s May 5 earnings presentation. Ford Pro’s Q1 wholesale sales decreased to 352,000 units, down 13.9% YoY, according to the earnings presentation. 

While Ford Pro revenue and wholesale sales were down in Q1, service and subscription performance continued to grow, Ford Motor Chief Financial Officer Sherry House said during the May 5 earnings call. 

“In addition to adding [the] new service elite base, mobile vans are driving growth in customer-paid mobile repair orders, which are now 7% of all customer-paid repair orders,” he said. “On the software side, Pro’s paid subscriptions, which deliver better than 50% gross margin, rose to 675,000, up 20% from a year ago with outsized growth in higher value services like fleet telematics, driving 40% growth in average revenue per unit.” 

Still, Ford Pro’s quarterly EBIT landed at $1.3 billion in Q1, down 56.5% YoY, according to the earnings presentation. 

GM commercial financing receivables jump again

Meanwhile, General Motors’ fleet sales rose 14.4% to 239,000 units in Q1, according to the company’s April 29 earnings release. GM North America fleet sales totaled 172,000 units in Q1, up 22% YoY, while the company’s overall fleet sales as a percentage of total vehicle sales landed at 16.5%, up compared with 15.5% in Q1 2024. 

GM Financial’s commercial receivables rose 13.4% YoY to $16.9 billion, according to the company’s April 29 GM Financial release. The lender also increased its allowance for commercial loan losses to $88 million in Q1, up 151.4% YoY. 

GM’s fleet sales improved as the OEM expanded its product portfolio, Paul Jacobson, executive vice president and CFO, said during the company’s May 1 earnings call. 

“When you look at the quality and the demand that we’ve had for our vehicles over the last few years as we’ve refreshed that fleet, it really is a strong anchor for great financial performance,” he said. “I think we’ve done a lot in terms of our go-to market strategy, approaching it with more discipline in production, inventory management as well as making sure that we were pricing our products appropriately and not necessarily over indexing into incentives.” 

Shares of Ford Motor Co. [NYSE: F] were up 27 cents or 2.65% from market open to $10.44 as of market close today. The company has a market cap of $40.44 billion.  

Shares of General Motors Co. [NYSE: GM] were up 8 cents or 0.18% from market open to $45.46 as of market close today. It has a market cap of $43.63 billion. 

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