Ferrari Shares Slide After Luce EV Reveal

BBC Business reported Monday that the Ferrari Luce electric car sent the Italian automaker’s stock down more than 8% on the Milan exchange. Shares also dropped over 5% in New York trading. The selloff followed Ferrari’s unveiling of the Luce, a $640,000 five-seat all-electric vehicle built in collaboration with LoveFrom, the design agency co-founded by former Apple chief design officer Sir Jony Ive.

A Radical Departure for the Prancing Horse

The Luce breaks sharply from Ferrari’s traditional silhouette. It is the company’s first five-seater and its first fully battery-powered production car. CEO Benedetto Vigna presented the model in Rome, noting it required roughly five years of development. The name means “light” in Italian.

Performance figures are aggressive. Four individual electric motors, one at each wheel, propel the Luce from zero to 60mph in approximately 2.5 seconds. Ferrari says all components are manufactured in-house to guarantee long-term repairability and preserve resale value.

Social Media Reaction Divides Sharply

Online commentary was polarised almost immediately after the reveal. Some posts on X compared the launch unfavourably to Jaguar’s widely criticised electric concept car, with one user writing that Ferrari had “killed their brand.” Others praised the styling as a design masterclass.

Chief Design Officer Flavio Manzoni acknowledged the car is “polarising” in an interview published alongside the launch. He told interviewer Cleo Abram that strong reactions are a normal part of bringing genuinely new ideas to market.

Context: Rivals Are Retreating From EVs

Ferrari’s move runs counter to a broader pullback across the luxury automotive sector. Lamborghini abandoned its all-electric roadmap entirely, pivoting to hybrids after judging demand too weak. Porsche has similarly curtailed EV investment, squeezed between sluggish Chinese sales and U.S. tariff pressure. Ford and Volkswagen have also leaned back toward combustion vehicles, partly in response to the rollback of federal EV incentives under President Donald Trump.

Ferrari insists it will keep petrol and hybrid models in production alongside the Luce. The brand’s ultra-exclusive strategy has historically protected it from volume-market pressures. Even so, Ferrari shares have lost more than 30% over the past twelve months, a decline that mirrors a wider slump in global luxury spending as persistent inflation erodes high-end demand.

The Luce is expected to reach customers later this year.

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