Volvo spinoff Polestar had a rough 2024, and 2025 looks like it could be just as difficult.
The EV maker announced Thursday that it expects to generate less revenue in fiscal year 2024 than it did in 2023, after previously estimating sales would stay the same. That’s thanks to “fewer than expected Polestar 3 and Polestar 4 sales,” which was driven in part by a global EV price war.
Flagging sales have put pressure on Polestar from its lenders. One year ago, the automaker received a $950 million loan from a syndicate of banks. Polestar was supposed to generate more than $5.3 billion in revenue in 2024 as part of that loan agreement.
The company won’t report its final 2024 financial figures for a few more months, but revenue is going to be well under 2023’s figure of $2.4 billion, according to Thursday’s guidance. (Polestar said investors should expect a “mid-teens percentage decline.”) In turn, Polestar said it has worked with its parent company, Chinese conglomerate Geely Holdings, and the banks behind the loan, to amend that revenue target.
Polestar also announced Thursday that it has to re-do all of its financial statements dating back more than two years because of accounting errors related to the tooling it uses to build cars. The company said it underreported assets and liabilities related to that tooling along with “other smaller errors that have been identified will also be corrected as part of this restatement process.”
This all comes after Polestar went through layoffs and appointed a new CEO, CFO, and COO in 2024. Last year also saw the company lose the financial backing of Volvo.
Polestar is still holding on to its hopes that new models will help boost sales. The Polestar 5 — a sedan based on the sharp Precept concept debuted in 2021 — will launch later this year. Polestar plans to expand sales into France this year.
Polestar also shared Thursday that the upcoming Polestar 7 will be a “premium compact SUV,” giving it an entrant into a popular and profitable vehicle segment. But the company has to survive long enough to get to that model — for which it did not give a release date.
