While you, mere mortal of average income whose bank account cyclically drops faster than those amusement-park rides, sit in your living room and think about how unfortunate your upcoming monthly bills are since it’s the holidays, the wealthy inhabitants of this world are buying more and more Ferraris.
Bloomberg reports that Ferrari will up production next year since it’s reaching its sales target of 9,000 vehicles annually an entire year early, according to people who asked not to be named. The sources said the issue isn’t public, and a Ferrari spokesperson declined to comment to Bloomberg. According to the story, Ferrari also recently reached a major profit goal two years early and plans to double operating profit by 2022.
Why, now, would Ferrari sales be way above target? Because the numbers of millionaires and billionaires keep going up! And more money means supercars, of course. From Bloomberg:
Ferrari planned to reach full-year sales of 9,000 cars in 2019, according to filings for the carmaker’s U.S. initial public offering in October 2015. Ferrari stock has more than doubled since its debut on the New York Stock Exchange, and its 83 percent gain this year marks the best performance among U.S. automakers in 2017, to value the company at $20.1 billion. The shares Tuesday rose 0.2 percent to $106.66 as of 11:43 a.m. in New York, reversing a decline earlier in the day.
Sales growth is being driven as the population of wealthy individuals surges. The number of millionaires worldwide surged 36 percent to 13.6 million people in the 10 years through 2016 and may rise another 37 percent in the following decade, according to the Wealth Report by real estate company Knight Frank. The number of billionaires increased 45 percent in the period, boosted by gains in the Asia-Pacific area.
Ferrari has a waiting list of more than 12 months for most of its cars, according to Bloomberg, and the story said part of its plan to boost profit is by growing its lineup “while maintaining the exclusivity of its $200,000-and-up models.” At the beginning of the year, the company planned to up profit with more special-edition supercars.
Either way, nothing stays exclusive if this millionaire and billionaire thing stays contagious. Time to get out of your living room and start asking rich people to cough on you, because it’s worth a try.