New York, May 26, 2026, 19:01 (EDT)
Ford Motor Co. shares climbed Tuesday in the first U.S. equity session after the Memorial Day break, extending a sharp May run as investors continued to price in the automaker’s push into energy storage. The stock gained about 2.6% in regular trading and touched $15.54, a 52-week high, on volume of roughly 90 million shares.
The point of the trade is no longer just pickups, pricing or U.S. auto demand. Ford is trying to turn battery capacity built for electric vehicles into battery energy storage systems, or BESS — large battery units that store electricity and release it when power grids, data centers or industrial users need it.
U.S. markets had been closed Monday for Memorial Day. NYSE core trading runs from 9:30 a.m. to 4 p.m. ET, putting the regular session shut by the time of this filing, with late trading available on some venues into the evening.
Ford outpaced a firm but less lively auto tape. General Motors rose 1.27%, Tesla gained 1.77%, and the S&P 500 advanced 0.61% to 7,519.12, while the Dow slipped 0.23%.
The immediate backdrop is Ford Energy’s five-year framework agreement with EDF power solutions North America, announced last week, under which EDF can procure up to 4 gigawatt-hours of DC Block BESS each year, or as much as 20 GWh over the term. Deliveries are expected to begin in 2028.
Lisa Drake, president of Ford Energy, said the EDF agreement validates demand for a supplier with “industrial-scale manufacturing discipline.” Tristan Grimbert, CEO of EDF power solutions North America, said supply-chain reliability and product quality were “paramount.”
The timing helps. U.S. energy-storage developers installed a first-quarter record 9.7 GWh of new capacity, up 32% from a year earlier, Reuters reported, citing the Solar Energy Industries Association and Benchmark Mineral Intelligence. SEIA interim President and CEO Darren Van’t Hof said the quarter underscored the “fundamental values” of storage, including grid reliability and protection from fuel-price shocks. Reuters
Wall Street has treated the move as an opening to revalue part of Ford away from the low-multiple auto cycle. Morgan Stanley analysts said Ford’s licensing relationship with China’s CATL, a major battery maker, was an “underappreciated strategic competitive advantage” and said they expected supply agreements with large commercial customers in coming months, Reuters reported earlier this month. Reuters
The energy push comes on top of better recent numbers. Ford reported first-quarter revenue of $43.3 billion, net income of $2.5 billion and adjusted earnings before interest and taxes — profit before financing and tax costs, excluding some items — of $3.5 billion. It also raised full-year adjusted EBIT guidance to $8.5 billion to $10.5 billion and said capital spending included $1.5 billion for Ford Energy.
Still, Ford’s electric-vehicle unit is not fixed. Model e lost $777 million in the first quarter, and Ford’s 2026 outlook includes $4.0 billion to $4.5 billion of Model e losses, a reminder that the storage business is being built while the company works through an expensive EV reset.
Not everyone on the Street wants to chase the move. Barclays analyst Dan Levy said mid-month that the artificial-intelligence and data-center-driven upmove looked “overdone,” though he also praised Ford’s warranty-cost improvement and called its 2026 guidance conservative, according to Investing.com. Investing.com
But the trade now carries a bigger proof burden. EDF deliveries do not start until 2028, and Ford still has to show it can build utility-grade storage at scale, defend margins, manage warranty risk and navigate policy questions tied to battery supply chains. If data-center and utility orders come more slowly, or if the market decides Ford Energy is still too small to offset EV losses, some of this month’s stock move could unwind quickly.
