"Ford’s dividends might sound like a matter only of concern for the company’s shareholders, but U.S. taxpayers should care. Over the years, Ford has mooched some $8 billion from federal and state public troughs. And just before leaving office, former Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm in late December finalized a controversial $9.63 billion below-market loan to cover most of Ford’s $11.4 billion EV projects in Tennessee and Kentucky.
Ford uses what it calls “adjusted free cash flow” to justify these rich payouts. Weil prefers to call it “cash flow before bad stuff.” The technical Wall Street term for Ford’s financial window dressing: putting lipstick on a pig.
And what have taxpayers gotten so far? Broken promises. Ford’s Super Duty EV plant in Tennessee, once scheduled to open this year, is now pushed back to 2028. Its Tennessee battery plant, originally planned for 2025, won’t open until 2027. One of two promised Kentucky battery plants has been delayed indefinitely.
The only major firm commitment Ford has delivered on is its dividend.
At the very top sits William Clay Ford Jr. He controls nearly 19 million Class B shares, which at 2024’s dividend rate would have delivered around $11 million in cash — on top of the $20 million he collected as executive chairman, a role I’d guess mostly entails overseeing CEO Jim Farley and managing board proceedings. Farley himself hauled in $25 million last year and has pocketed more than $107 million since taking Ford’s corporate wheel five years ago.
Much of Farley’s compensation was stock, so if Ford’s shares decline, so does his personal fortune.
For Bill Ford’s distant cousins, there’s less, but still plenty: hundreds of thousands of dollars a year simply for being born into the family. That’s why the dividend is existential. It sustains Palm Beach lifestyles as much as it secures control of Dearborn. If the spigot slows, it could shake both fortunes and the family’s loyalty to the company.
Weil exposed just how far Ford is stretching. The company used the free cash flow – money left over after paying operating expenses – it generated in 2024 to justify its 2025 first-quarter dividend — the equivalent of using last year’s paycheck to prove you can pay this year’s mortgage after your boss cut your salary. Ford expects to generate less free cash flow this year, a shortfall it partly blamed on Trump’s tariffs."
https://www.deadlinedetroit.com/articles/33555/starkman_today_s_ford_family_is_milking_the_company_not_saving_it