Polestar stock surges after reporting first-ever profit as a public company

In something of a change this earnings season, an electric carmaker (other than Tesla) actually reported a profit for the quarter.

Polestar (PSNY), the Swedish-based company backed by Volvo and China’s Geely, reported its first gross profit as a public company since completing its SPAC merger earlier this year.

For the quarter, Polestar reported:

Though Polestar did miss on the top line, sales were up 105% for the quarter versus last year, and it was enough to eke out a $4 million gross profit for the quarter. The company was able to trim its operating loss for Q3 by one-third compared to last year as well.

Through the first nine months of the year, Polestar reported $54 million in gross profit on $1.48 billion in sales. During that time Polestar delivered 30,424 cars globally, and the company said it was on track to hit its delivery target of 50,000 cars for the year. The company expects $2.4 billion in sales for the year, predicting that performance will be “driven by strong Q4 2022 sales.”

Polestar also said it was adequately funded through 2023, citing its earlier financing package worth $1.6 billion, provided by its corporate parents Volvo and Geely.

Polestar says its product pipeline is slated to reveal new product launches like the Polestar 4 SUV in 2023, the Polestar 5 grand touring sedan in 2024, and the Polestar 6 roadster in 2026. Polestar previously announced its Polestar 3 SUV would be coming in the fourth quarter next year, and will eventually be built at Volvo’s plant in South Carolina in mid-2024.

All was not good news however, as Polestar CEO Thomas Ingenlath said supply chain issues and parts shortages would hamper production.

“Will the situation improve next year? No, we expect this again to be something that keeps us busy,” Ingenlath said in a media briefing. Earlier this year Polestar trimmed its production forecast to 50,000 from 65,000 due to COVID-related shutdowns in China. Polestar builds its cars at plant in Chengdu, China.

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Nonetheless, Polestar shares are surging today on the back of today’s results. With the backing of its corporate parents, Polestar has been able to leverage the manufacturing and technology capabilities of Volvo and Geely to see its “asset-light” business model succeed when other pure-play EV rivals like Rivian (RIVN), Lucid (LCID), and even Nio (NIO) struggle for profitability.

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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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