General Motors Co GM’s pledge to switch to an all-electric portfolio by 2035 has begun to take shape as it pumps in billions of dollars and set tighter deadlines towards electrification — and this journey prominently started in 2016 with the unveiling of the Chevy Bolt.
GM, under CEO Mary Barra, in January 2016 launched the production version of the Chevrolet Bolt electric car with a $30,000 price tag, accounting for federal incentives, and a 200-mile range.
The launch from GM — the legacy car player that represents U.S. manufacturing to some — was seen as a fitting challenger to Tesla Inc TSLA.
The Elon Musk-led company’s Model S, which then had a 265-mile range, was significantly more expensive compared to Chevy Bolt. GM has since managed to bring the prices down further.
After half a decade of selling the Bolt to customers, GM is now speeding up plans towards electrification. Barra in June said the company would spend $35 billion through 2025 towards electric and autonomous vehicles, a 30% jump over its previous forecast under a new plan.
GM also aims to more than double revenue by 2030 to about $280 billion and expects to have more than half of its factories in China and North America be capable of EV production.
Legacy rivals Ford Motor Co F and Volkswagen Ag VWAGY too have drawn plans to play catch up in the market disrupted by Tesla.
Chevy Bolt, which is GM’s only electric vehicle currently on sale, has, however, hit a bit of a roadblock with a costly recall. GM has recalled 142,000 Bolts that the automaker has made since 2016. The recalls are related to manufacturing defects in battery modules supplied by LG Electronics. Earlier this month GM said it would recover nearly $2 billion recall cost from LG Electronics.
GM is currently prioritizing fixing the huge recalls. The automaker plans to resume limited production of Bolt at its Orion Assembly plant on Nov. 1, as per Reuters.
So, through this journey, how an investment in GM would have fared?
The Investment: If you invested $1,000 on Jan 5, 2016 — when GM unveiled the Chevy Bolt — in the stock, the investment would have fetched notable returns as of Monday.
A $1,000 investment on Jan. 5, 2016, would be worth $1,768.7 as of Tuesday, a jump of 76.87% for the investor.
GM stock closed 0.66% lower at $57.37 a share on Tuesday. The stock has risen 41.6% YTD.
Photo: Courtesy of GM
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