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How the Chevy Bolt EV became GM’s 1.8 billion dollar problem
General Motors has already spent $800 million on recalls of the Chevrolet Bolt EV due to defective battery cells that caused fires, but the price has gone up once again. On Friday, the automaker announced it would funnel an additional $1 billion into additional voluntary recalls of the electric sedan “out of an abundance of caution.”
The Bolt EV was issued its third recall in a year on Friday, following one in late July and another from November 2020 as defective battery cells were causing some builds of the vehicle to catch fire. GM and its battery supplier LG Energy Solutions stated that “the simultaneous presence of two rare manufacturing defects in the same battery cell” could cause a fire if the battery pack is charged fully.
2019 Chevy Bolt EV (Credit: Chevrolet)
GM advised customers to do the following:
- . Customers should, whether or not they received the current software update, return their vehicle to the 90% state of charge limitation using Hilltop Reserve mode (for 2017-2018 model years) or Target Charge Level (for 2019 model year) mode. If customers are unable to successfully make these changes, or do not feel comfortable making these changes, we are asking them to visit their dealer to have these adjustments completed.
- Additionally, we ask that customers charge their vehicle after each use and avoid depleting their battery below approximately 70 miles of remaining range, where possible.
- Out of an abundance of caution, customers should continue to park their vehicles outside immediately after charging and not leave their vehicles charging overnight.
GM’s Q2 2021 Earnings Call stated that it had spent $1.3 billion in recalls in Q2, with $800 million of that going toward battery bugs in the Bolt. As a precaution, GM is now applying additional models to the recall:
“General Motors is voluntarily expanding the current Chevrolet Bolt EV recall to cover the remaining 2019 and all 2020-2022 model year vehicles, including the Bolt EUV. In rare circumstances, the batteries supplied to GM for these vehicles may have two manufacturing defects – a torn anode tab and folded separator – present in the same battery cell, which increases the risk of fire. Out of an abundance of caution, GM will replace defective battery modules in Chevrolet Bolt EVs and EUVs with new modules, with an expected additional cost of approximately $1 billion.”
The new recall population includes the following:
- 9,335 (6,989 in the U.S. and 1,212 in Canada) – 2019 model year Bolt EVs that were not included in the previous recall
- 63,683 (52,403 in the U.S. and 9,019 in Canada) – 2020–2022 model year Chevrolet Bolt EVs and EUVs
The batteries will be replaced and come with an 8-year/100,000-mile limited warranty (or 8-year/160,000 km limited warranty in Canada).
With the additional $1 billion going toward Bolt recalls, GM has spent $1.8 billion on the battery replacement offensive for the vehicle. It’s a good precaution, but it sure is getting costly for the legacy car company. GM also provided new instructions for customers in the new recall population:
1. Set their vehicle to a 90 percent state of charge limitation using Target Charge Level mode. Instructions on how to do this are available on chevy.com/boltevrecall. If customers are unable to successfully make these changes, or do not feel comfortable making these changes, GM is asking them to visit their dealer to have these adjustments completed.
2. Charge their vehicle more frequently and avoid depleting their battery below approximately 70 miles (113 kilometers) of remaining range, where possible.
3. Park their vehicles outside immediately after charging and should not leave their vehicles charging indoors overnight.
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Tesla has entered an interesting situation with its Full Self-Driving suite in California, as the State’s Department of Motor Vehicles had adopted an order for a suspension of the company’s sales license, but it immediately put it on hold.
The company has been granted a reprieve as the DMV is giving Tesla an opportunity to “remedy the situation.” After the suspension was recommended for 30 days as a penalty, the DMV said it would give Tesla 90 days to allow the company to come into compliance.
The DMV is accusing Tesla of misleading consumers by using words like Autopilot and Full Self-Driving on its advanced driver assistance (ADAS) features.
The State’s DMV Director, Steve Gordon, said that he hoped “Tesla will find a way to get these misleading statements corrected.” However, Tesla responded to the story on Tuesday, stating that this was a “consumer protection” order for the company using the term Autopilot.
It said “not one single customer came forward to say there’s a problem.” It added that “sales in California will continue uninterrupted.”
This was a “consumer protection” order about the use of the term “Autopilot” in a case where not one single customer came forward to say there’s a problem.
Sales in California will continue uninterrupted.
— Tesla North America (@tesla_na) December 17, 2025
Tesla has used the terms Autopilot and Full Self-Driving for years, but has added the term “(Supervised)” to the end of the FSD suite, hoping to remedy some of the potential issues that regulators in various areas might have with the labeling of the program.
It might not be too long before Tesla stops catching flak for using the Full Self-Driving name to describe its platform.
Tesla Robotaxi goes driverless as Musk confirms Safety Monitor removal testing
The Robotaxi suite has continued to improve, and this week, vehicles were spotted in Austin without any occupants. CEO Elon Musk would later confirm that Tesla had started testing driverless rides in Austin, hoping to launch rides without any supervision by the end of the year.
Tesla stock (NASDAQ: TSLA) closed at an all-time high on Tuesday, jumping over 3 percent during the day and finishing at $489.88.
The price beats the previous record close, which was $479.86.
Shares have had a crazy year, dipping more than 40 percent from the start of the year. The stock then started to recover once again around late April, when its price started to climb back up from the low $200 level.
This week, Tesla started to climb toward its highest levels ever, as it was revealed on Sunday that the company was testing driverless Robotaxis in Austin. The spike in value pushed the company’s valuation to $1.63 trillion.
Tesla Robotaxi goes driverless as Musk confirms Safety Monitor removal testing
It is the seventh-most valuable company on the market currently, trailing Nvidia, Apple, Alphabet (Google), Microsoft, Amazon, and Meta.
Shares closed up $14.57 today, up over 3 percent.
The stock has gone through a lot this year, as previously mentioned. Shares tumbled in Q1 due to CEO Elon Musk’s involvement with the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), which pulled his attention away from his companies and left a major overhang on their valuations.
However, things started to rebound halfway through the year, and as the government started to phase out the $7,500 tax credit, demand spiked as consumers tried to take advantage of it.
Q3 deliveries were the highest in company history, and Tesla responded to the loss of the tax credit with the launch of the Model 3 and Model Y Standard.
Additionally, analysts have announced high expectations this week for the company on Wall Street as Robotaxi continues to be the focus. With autonomy within Tesla’s sights, things are moving in the direction of Robotaxi being a major catalyst for growth on the Street in the coming year.
Elon Musk
Tesla needs to come through on this one Robotaxi metric, analyst says
“We think the key focus from here will be how fast Tesla can scale driverless operations (including if Tesla’s approach to software/hardware allows it to scale significantly faster than competitors, as the company has argued), and on profitability.”
Tesla needs to come through on this one Robotaxi metric, Mark Delaney of Goldman Sachs says.
Tesla is in the process of rolling out its Robotaxi platform to areas outside of Austin and the California Bay Area. It has plans to launch in five additional cities, including Houston, Dallas, Miami, Las Vegas, and Phoenix.
However, the company’s expansion is not what the focus needs to be, according to Delaney. It’s the speed of deployment.
The analyst said:
“We think the key focus from here will be how fast Tesla can scale driverless operations (including if Tesla’s approach to software/hardware allows it to scale significantly faster than competitors, as the company has argued), and on profitability.”
Profitability will come as the Robotaxi fleet expands. Making that money will be dependent on when Tesla can initiate rides in more areas, giving more customers access to the program.
There are some additional things that the company needs to make happen ahead of the major Robotaxi expansion, one of those things is launching driverless rides in Austin, the first city in which it launched the program.
This week, Tesla started testing driverless Robotaxi rides in Austin, as two different Model Y units were spotted with no occupants, a huge step in the company’s plans for the ride-sharing platform.
Tesla Robotaxi goes driverless as Musk confirms Safety Monitor removal testing
CEO Elon Musk has been hoping to remove Safety Monitors from Robotaxis in Austin for several months, first mentioning the plan to have them out by the end of 2025 in September. He confirmed on Sunday that Tesla had officially removed vehicle occupants and started testing truly unsupervised rides.
Although Safety Monitors in Austin have been sitting in the passenger’s seat, they have still had the ability to override things in case of an emergency. After all, the ultimate goal was safety and avoiding any accidents or injuries.
Goldman Sachs reiterated its ‘Neutral’ rating and its $400 price target. Delaney said, “Tesla is making progress with its autonomous technology,” and recent developments make it evident that this is true.
Tesla enters interesting situation with Full Self-Driving in California
Tesla stock closes at all-time high on heels of Robotaxi progress
