DETROIT. Ford Motor (NYSE: F), a member of Detroit’s “Big Three”, today announced that it lost $2 billion in the first quarter of 2023, as much as it lost in its entire 2022 fiscal year.
Does not stand for “Fix or repair daily”.
“Obviously, we don’t like to lose money,” said VP-Finance Kevin Herndon. “We may issue revised numbers after we check our other pairs of pants and behind the sofa cushions in the employee lounge.”
The market received the news with approval, and the company’s stock rose on late day trading by investors who had run out of soda cans to redeem for five cent deposits. “We have downgraded our recommendation from ‘Sell’ to ‘We’re Not Going to Give You an Allowance Until You Learn to Take Care of Your Money’,” said Alan Winegard of Vista Securities in New York. “It would be one thing if they were spending more than they were taking in, but to just lose the money is pretty pathetic.”
Edsel Fever–Catch It!
Ford is associated with the most disastrous model design in automotive history, the Edsel, and industry analysts say that fiasco haunts the company to this day. “The problem with the Edsel was that it was ahead of its time, if by ‘time’ you mean the date on which the UFO landed in Roswell, New Mexico,” notes Paul Sorpato, an expert on the 1950’s. “Space aliens may have taken some of that money.”
Roswell alien: “Does it come with power steering?”
Ford executives said they would also check the coin trays of returned and re-possessed vehicles for change drivers use to pay tolls. “We test the trays to see if the nickels, dimes and quarters all fit in their slots,” say Chief of Operations Norman Daly. “Once a coin falls between the seat and the big transmission hump, it’s gone forever.”