Ford Motor Company’s shares experienced their most significant one-day rally in roughly six years on Wednesday, climbing 13% as Wall Street showed strong enthusiasm for the automaker’s emerging energy storage division.
The dramatic stock movement followed analysis from Morgan Stanley that spotlighted information Ford had shared earlier this week about its energy storage subsidiary, which the company first unveiled in late 2021. Lisa Drake, a pivotal figure in Ford’s electric vehicle initiatives, leads the new division.
The energy storage venture emerged after Ford took a massive $19.5 billion writedown on its electric vehicle operations last December. The company decided to transform Kentucky facilities originally designated for electric vehicle battery manufacturing into energy storage production sites.
Ford’s energy storage operation will utilize LFP prismatic battery technology, which relies on iron-based chemistry. The products are designed to support data centers, utility companies, and major industrial and commercial clients.
Wall Street analysts highlighted Ford’s licensing partnership with CATL, a leading Chinese battery manufacturer, as a significant competitive edge. “We believe Ford’s relationship with CATL is an underappreciated strategic competitive advantage,” Morgan Stanley analysts stated, predicting the automaker will secure supply contracts with major commercial customers in the coming months.
The company plans to invest $2 billion in the energy storage business and anticipates beginning customer deliveries in late 2027. Ford projects it will deploy a minimum of 20 GWh on an annual basis.
