Tesla moves past Ford as second-most valuable car company in U.S.

April 5 (UPI) — Tesla has moved past Ford to become the second-most valuable car company in the United States.

The maker of electric cars has a market capitalization of $48 billion, ahead of Ford’s $45 billion. No. 1 is General Motors at $50 billion. And Japan’s Honda is worth $54 billion.

Tesla’s CEO Elon Musk poked fun at those who sell the stock short.

“Stormy weather in Shortville…” he posted on Twitter on Monday.

Those are stock valuations as Tesla doesn’t sell anywhere near as many cars as those companies or Fiat Chrysler, Toyota and Volkswagen.

For comparison sake, Tesla said Sunday that it sold about 25,000 of its Model S and Model X vehicles worldwide in the first quarter compared with 617,000 by Ford in the United States and 690,000 GM cars and trucks in the first three months.

Tesla said it expects to sell 47,000 to 50,000 vehicles in the first half of the year.

Tesla’s stock increased 7.3 percent Monday to an all-time high of $298.52 on Nasdaq. On Tuesday, shares topped $300.

Ford’s shares declined 3 percent Monday after a weak sales report for last month.

Tesla has lost $2.3 billion the past five years on revenue of $7 billion last year. Ford’s net income was $26 billion during that time, including revenue of $151.8 billion last year.

“I don’t know if people want electric cars, but people want Tesla,” Ben Kallo, an analyst at Robert W. Baird & Co said to Bloomberg. “I’m not an Elon Musk worshiper, but people that would normally buy a Porsche are buying Teslas right now.”

Musk also runs SpaceX, which designs, manufactures and launches advanced rockets and spacecraft.