(NEW YORK) — Twitter Blue, the newly revamped subscription service that allows users to access verification if they pay a monthly fee of $8, appeared to be unavailable on the company’s Apple iOS app for at least some users on Friday. A rise of fake accounts on the platform had coincided with the rollout of Twitter Blue two days earlier.
The flood of fake accounts impersonating public figures and brands on Twitter after the the launch of paid verification badges prompted the company to reinstate a second layer of “official” tags on Thursday, the company said in a statement.
Impostor accounts posed as a slew of well-known people and companies, including basketball star LeBron James, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, gaming company Nintendo of America and even Tesla, the electric vehicle maker run by Twitter’s owner, Elon Musk.
On Wednesday, the company said it had opted against a second layer of verification for some prominent accounts that would add an “official” tag as a means of distinguishing them from impostors. A day later, the company said that it had reversed course and would add the “official” label to some accounts.
Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey, a Democrat, said Friday that his account was among the well-known users that had been impersonated.
“Safeguards like blue checks let users be smart, critical consumers of news and information in Twitter’s global town square,” Markey said. “Truth can’t be put on sale for $8.”
Previously, the company verified celebrities, politicians, journalists and prominent figures on a case-by-case basis in an effort to prevent impersonation.
Musk, who acquired Twitter late last month, has already made dramatic changes: firing top executives, laying off half of the company’s staff and forming a content moderation council that will review account reinstatements. The rise of fake accounts after the launch of the new subscription service marks a significant shift in the core product and user experience.
The company has vowed to permanently suspend accounts that take part in impersonation without clearly labeling it a parody account. But recent mass layoffs, which affected employees who work in content moderation, have raised concerns over Twitter’s capacity and willingness to police users.
In protest of the impersonation risks posed by the new subscription service, high-profile users like comedian Kathy Griffin over the weekend changed their usernames to “Elon Musk.” Griffin was suspended from Twitter and remained off the platform as of Tuesday afternoon.
Musk later said Griffin could regain access to her account by joining the revamped subscription service, but it was unclear if the offer was sincere.
The rollout of the new subscription offering was planned for Sunday but the company opted to delay the release until Wednesday, the day after the midterm elections, after some users and advocates raised fears over its implications for election integrity.
Amid changes on the platform, several advertisers have paused their presence on Twitter since Musk took ownership, including Pfizer, General Motors and United Airlines.
Musk, who said he overpaid for the platform at the purchasing price of $44 billion, faces pressure to boost the company’s revenue. Last week, he said that the company is losing $4 million each day.
(NEW YORK) — Elon Musk told Twitter staff during an all-hands meeting Thursday that they need to return to the office full-time, or “resignation accepted,” he can be heard saying in audio obtained exclusively by ABC News.
“Let me be crystal clear, if people do not return to the office when they are able to return to the office — they cannot remain at the company,” Musk is heard in the audio telling an employee who asked about his new plans for a 40-hour workweek at the company during an all-hands company meeting. “End of story.”
Audio excerpts from the meeting were obtained first by ABC News via a lawyer representing former Twitter employees in a lawsuit against the company. ABC News has verified the authenticity of the audio.
“Even if people returned to the office,” a Twitter employee can be heard replying to Musk, “the offices are separate offices — we won’t be in person anyways.”
“Yes,” Musk responds on the audio. “But you can still maximize the amount of in-person activity.”
Musk continued throughout the meeting to compare the company to Tesla.
“Tesla is not one place either, but you know, it’s basically if you can, if you can show up at an office and you do not show up at the office, resignation accepted — end of story,” Musk is heard saying.
“There are plenty of people at Tesla and SpaceX that do work remotely… but it is on an exception basis for exceptional people — and I totally understand if that doesn’t work for some people,” Musk is also heard saying. “But that’s the new philosophy for Twitter.”
Twitter began layoffs on Friday that will cut roughly half of its workforce, the company announced in an email, which ABC News reviewed.
The lawsuit alleges that Twitter violated federal and California laws by not giving staff proper notice before termination. The lawsuit was amended this week to include Twitter’s alleged unfair severance offers.
Twitter hasn’t responded to the lawsuit.
The attorney representing former Twitter employees in the class-action lawsuit, Shannon Liss-Riordan, said she plans to use Musk’s words against him.
“The audio makes clear that Musk’s elimination of remote work, with no notice, is an effort to claim employees have resigned when, in fact, they have been pushed out, so that the company can try to avoid obligations under the WARN Act and promises regarding severance,” Liss-Riordan told ABC News. “This new ridiculous move is just one of the schemes Musk has come up with in an attempt to avoid paying laid off employees what they are owed.”
Musk has implemented the same back-to-work policy at Tesla and SpaceX.
Musk closed a deal to acquire Twitter in late October. Some of Twitter’s top executives were fired, including CEO Parag Agrawal, chief financial officer Ned Segal, chief legal officer Vijaya Gadde and general counsel Sam Edgett.
(NEW YORK) — Senior members of Twitter’s privacy and security teams have exited the company, according to an internal message from a company lawyer obtained by ABC News that warns of employment contract violations and legal repercussions if new owner Elon Musk doesn’t comply with an FTC agreement.
Among the staffers that left were chief privacy officer Damien Kieran, chief compliance officer Marianne Fogarty and chief information officer Lea Kissner, according to the message. Kissner confirmed their resignation in a Tweet earlier Thursday morning. None have responded to ABC’s request for comment.
The message was posted to Twitter’s Slack by a lawyer on Twitter’s privacy team and viewable to all staff.
“Over the last two weeks, Elon has shown that he cares only about recouping the losses he’s incurring as a result of failing to get out of his binding obligation to buy Twitter,” the lawyer wrote to fellow employees.
The Verge reported first on the lawyer’s message.
The Twitter lawyer’s message comes after Musk announced he’d require employees to be in the office 40 hours a week, eliminating remote work. The lawyer believes this is a “fundamental change to our employment contracts,” they wrote to the Slack group consisting of over 2,000 members.
“I do not, personally, believe that Twitter employees have an obligation to return to the office. Certainly not on no notice,” the attorney wrote.
“He chose to enter into that agreement,” the Twitter lawyer added regarding Musk’s acquisition of Twitter. “All of us are being put through this as a result of the choices he made.”
The Twitter lawyer reminded coworkers that they still have unlimited PTO.
“Perhaps today is a good day to take some rest and recharge,” they wrote.
This member of Twitter’s senior counsel went on to describe Musk’s apparent disregard for any potential legal repercussions that could present themselves in the near future.
In the message, the attorney brought up the Federal Trade Commission settlement Twitter agreed to in May; the company was caught using telephone numbers and emails for targeted advertising, even though they were only supposed to be used for multi-factor authentication logins. The FTC hit the company with a $150 million fine and provided Twitter with a list of new compliance rules.
If the company refuses to comply with the FTC agreement, Twitter could be fined billions of dollars, according to the company lawyer’s Slack message.
But the lawyer claims in the message that they heard Alex Spiro, Musk’s lawyer and current head of Twitter’s legal department, say “that Elon is willing to take on a huge amount of risk in relation to this company and its users, because ‘Elon puts rockets into space, he’s not afraid of the FTC.'”
Twitter’s legal team is asking engineers to “self-certify” compliance with FTC rules and other privacy laws, according to the company attorney’s message.
“This will put a huge amount of personal, professional and legal risk onto engineers,” they wrote. “I anticipate that all of you will be pressured by management into pushing out changes that will likely lead to major incidents.”
An FTC spokesperson tells ABC News “we are tracking recent developments at Twitter with deep concern. No CEO or company is above the law, and companies must follow our consent decrees. Our revised consent order gives us new tools to ensure compliance, and we are prepared to use them.”
The Twitter lawyer left the number for Twitter’s Ethic’s Helpline and a link to https://whistlebloweraid.org/ at the end of the email.
“It’s been an honor working with all of you,” they wrote. “I’ll be taking a day of PTO today.”
Twitter has not responded to ABC News’ request for comment.
(WASHINGTON) — Consumer prices are up 7.7% over the year ending in October, but that’s a significant drop from the 8.2% inflation rate a month prior and below 8% for the first time since February.
On a monthly basis, the consumer price index increased at a rate of 0.4%, rising at the same pace that it underwent in September, the Bureau of Labor Statistics said on Thursday.
While year-over-year inflation slowed, it remained near a 40-year high, defying a string of aggressive rate hikes from the Federal Reserve aimed at bringing inflation down to normal levels.
The Fed last week raised its short-term borrowing rate another 0.75%, marking the latest in a string of jumbo-sized borrowing cost increases imposed by the Fed in recent months as it tries to slash price increases by cooling the economy and choking off demand.
The approach, however, risks tipping the U.S. into a recession and putting millions out of work.
The data release arrived two days after the midterm elections, when Democrats outperformed forecasts of a voter backlash against the party in control of Congress and the White House expected in part due to frustration over sky-high consumer prices.
Polling released days before the elections found that 80% of likely voters considered the economy a top issue in their vote for Congress; while 77% said the same about inflation specifically, an ABC News/Washington Post survey found.
Still, a Republican wave election did not materialize. As of Thursday, control of the House and Senate had yet to be determined.
Despite persistent inflation, growing evidence suggests that the Fed’s rate hikes have put the brakes on some economic activity.
Mortgage rates reached a 20-year high last month, as the U.S. faces an ongoing slowdown in home sales and housing construction.
Job growth has persisted at a strong rate but has shown signs of moderating.
The U.S. added 261,000 jobs in October, exceeding economist expectations and demonstrating the continued strength of the labor market.
But the hiring in October fell well below the typical jobs added over a given month in 2022. Monthly job growth has averaged 407,000 thus far in 2022 versus 562,000 per month in 2021, the jobs data showed.
While some data points to an economic slowdown, a government report released last month showed significant economic growth over three months ending in September.
U.S. gross domestic product grew 2.6% over that period; by contrast, economic activity shrank a combined 2.2% over the first six months of the year.
Inflation, however, remains a top concern for federal policymakers.
When facing high inflation, policymakers fear what’s referred to as a price-wage spiral, in which a rise in prices prompts workers to demand raises that help them afford goods, which in turn pushes up prices, leading to a self-perpetuating cycle of runaway inflation.
However, the October jobs data was the latest to ease such concerns. Average hourly earnings rose 4.7% over the past year, well below the inflation rate and a decline from 5% year-over-year wage growth the previous month.
(WASHINGTON) — Investors and consumers will closely watch the release of October inflation data on Thursday, little more than a week after the Federal Reserve intensified its fight to dial back inflation last matched four decades ago.
The Fed last week raised its short-term borrowing rate another 0.75%, marking the latest in a string of jumbo-sized borrowing cost increases imposed by the Fed in recent months as it tries to slash price increases by cooling the economy and choking off demand.
The approach, however, risks tipping the U.S. into a recession and putting millions out of work.
Economists expect that inflation over the year ending in October will fall to 7.9% — a highly elevated reading but one that would mark a slight slowdown from 8.2% year-over-year inflation reported the previous month.
The data release arrives two days after the midterm elections, when Democrats outperformed forecasts of a voter backlash against the party in control of Congress and the White House expected in part due to frustration over sky-high consumer prices.
Polling released days before the elections found that 80% of likely voters considered the economy a top issue in their vote for Congress; while 77% said the same about inflation specifically, an ABC News/Washington Post survey found.
Still, a Republican wave election did not materialize. As of Wednesday, control of the House and Senate had yet to be determined.
Despite persistent inflation, growing evidence suggests that the Fed’s rate hikes have put the brakes on some economic activity.
Mortgage rates reached a 20-year high last month, as the U.S. faces an ongoing slowdown in home sales and housing construction.
Job growth has persisted at a strong rate but has shown signs of moderating.
The U.S. added 261,000 jobs in October, exceeding economist expectations and demonstrating the continued strength of the labor market.
But the hiring in October fell well below the typical jobs added over a given month in 2022. Monthly job growth has averaged 407,000 thus far in 2022 versus 562,000 per month in 2021, the jobs data showed.
While some data points to an economic slowdown, a government report released last month showed significant economic growth over three months ending in September.
U.S. gross domestic product grew 2.6% over that period; by contrast, economic activity shrank a combined 2.2% over the first six months of the year.
Inflation, however, remains a top concern for federal policymakers.
When facing high inflation, policymakers fear what’s referred to as a price-wage spiral, in which a rise in prices prompts workers to demand raises that help them afford goods, which in turn pushes up prices, leading to a self-perpetuating cycle of runaway inflation.
However, the October jobs data was the latest to ease such concerns. Average hourly earnings rose 4.7% over the past year, well below the inflation rate and a decline from 5% year-over-year wage growth the previous month.
(NEW YORK) — Nebraska is projected to approve a $15 minimum wage for workers amid a nationwide push for wage hikes that has predominantly taken hold in liberal states like New York, California and Illinois.
The referendum, called Initiative Measure 433, garnered support from 59% of voters in Nebraska, while ballots opposing the measure stood at 41%, according to results reported by ABC News on Wednesday.
The measure will incrementally raise the state’s minimum wage from its current level of $9 per hour to $15 per hour by 2026. Over ensuing years, the minimum wage will move in accordance with inflation.
Nebraska joins at least nine states that have raised their wage floor to $15 per hour, representing a combined 40% of the U.S. workforce, data from the left-leaning National Employment Law Project showed. The majority of those states are liberal.
Battleground or conservative-leaning states have used ballot measures to impose more modest wage hikes in previous years. Voters in Arkansas, Missouri and Arizona brought the wage in their states as high as $12 per hour, according to the nonprofit research firm Ballotpedia.
The nationwide push for minimum wage hikes intensified in 2012, when fast food workers launched a campaign called Fight for $15, aiming to raise wages and unionize the fast food sector. The Service Employees International Union, or SEIU, one of the nation’s largest labor organizations, spent tens of millions of dollars in support of the effort.
The last federal minimum wage hike took place in 2009, when Congress raised the pay floor to its current level of $7.25. As of August, 30 states have raised their minimum wage above the federal level, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
The ballot measure in Nebraska was not the only wage-related referendum put in front of voters on Tuesday. In Washington, D.C., voters are projected to approve a measure that will gradually raise the minimum wage for tipped workers from its current level of $5.05 until it matches the wage floor for non-tipped workers by 2027, according to The New York Times.
In July, the minimum wage in Washington, D.C., for non-tipped workers increased from $15.20 per hour to $16.10 per hour.
(NEW YORK) — Mark Zuckerberg has announced that Meta will be laying off 11,000 of its employees — an estimated 13% of its workforce — and will also be taking “a number of additional steps to become a leaner and more efficient company.”
(NEW YORK) — As the midterm elections begin, sky-high prices for essentials like food and gasoline have become a major line of criticism leveled at Democrats, who control the White House and Congress.
In fact, the issue may be enough to drive the incumbent party out of power — just as it has helped fuel government turnover across the globe, some experts told ABC News.
Global inflation during the pandemic era has helped drive public opposition toward incumbent parties and politicians, contributing to shifts in power across a host of countries over the past year, some financial experts told ABC news.
While experts cautioned against generalizations that diminish other issues or political dynamics at play within a given country, they noted how frustration over living costs has animated efforts to change political leadership in ways that resemble voter sentiment in the U.S. leading up to the midterm elections.
“This is a global inflationary shock – many countries are seeing inflationary pressure they haven’t seen since the 1970s and 1980s,” Robert Kahn, the managing director of global macro-geoeconomics at the New York-based Eurasia Group, told ABC News. “It’s driving a level of unhappiness among populations that’s definitely putting pressure on governments.”
“A lot of what we’re seeing and feeling is a U.S. manifestation of what everyone else is dealing with,” he added.
In Brazil, where President Jair Bolsonaro cut taxes on fuel and electricity in an effort to slash prices over the months preceding an election that concluded in October, the nation nevertheless replaced him with a leftwing challenger.
Meanwhile, in England, Prime Minister Liz Truss responded to the highest inflation in four decades with an economic policy centered on tax cuts and energy price controls. Her tenure in office lasted just 44 days before market reaction and political disarray led to her stepping down.
Over the summer, Colombia elected the first leftist president in its history as the inflation rate soared near 10%. While in Sri Lanka, a couple months prior, a mass uprising led to the removal of the country’s sitting president, as protesters cited frustration over the fastest inflation rate in Asia.
“When essential prices explode in ways that people can’t pay them anymore, it’s like some basic social contract breaks,” Isabella Weber, a professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, told ABC News.
“People go to work and earn money and they can buy stuff that covers their basic needs on the market,” she added. “If they feel their wage isn’t sufficient to cover these basic needs, then this basic contract starts to crumble for too many people, which brings social and political consequences.”
The pattern this year matches a high rate of leadership change amid inflation crises around the world over the last half century, according to research authored by Kahn and Eurasia Group CEO Maziar Minovi. Examining 57 inflation shocks since 1970, they found government turnover in 58% of cases.
Further, when there was an election during or within two years of an inflation shock, it led to a change in government in roughly three out of every four instances, the study found.
To be sure, at least one expert said it’s too difficult to discern the political impact of inflation alongside other potential factors driving voter sentiment worldwide.
Carsten Kowalczyk, a professor of international economics at the Fletcher School at Tufts University, acknowledged the role that inflation has played historically in contributing to government turnover, but he said the political implications of current price hikes remain uncertain.
“It’s not clear how much inflation has really affected the outlook of folks,” he told ABC News. “Inflation may affect people differently.”
As with other global economic problems, inflation comes down to an imbalance between supply and demand.
Billions across the globe facing lockdowns replaced restaurant or leisure expenditures with couches and exercise bikes. The surge in demand followed a pandemic-induced flood of economic stimulus. Moreover, that stimulus brought about a speedy economic recovery from the March 2020 downturn, triggering a hiring blitz.
But the surge in demand for goods and labor far outpaced supply, as COVID-related bottlenecks slowed delivery times and infection fears kept workers on the sidelines.
In turn, prices and wages skyrocketed, prompting sky-high inflation. The war between Russia and Ukraine has exacerbated the price hikes, worsening a global shortage of oil and food. Such price increases have bedeviled countries across the globe, some of which have suffered much worse inflation than the U.S.
“We made a tradeoff in 2020: We’re going to save the economy and save people’s jobs by pumping trillions into the economy,” Aswath Damodaran, a professor of finance at New York University. “This inflation is the tradeoff. They were effectively delaying the pain that COVID brought to the global economy.”
Despite the global nature of inflation and limited policy levers available to President Joe Biden to reverse it, Democrats are being held accountable for a cost of living crisis experienced while they’ve controlled Congress and the White House, some experts said.
The share of likely voters who say economic issues are the most important concerns facing America stands at 44%, a jump from 36% who said so in July, according to a New York Times/Siena poll released last month. Those economy-focused voters overwhelmingly preferred Republicans, by more than a two-to-one margin, the poll said.
In a similar poll, released by NBC News in September, voters favored Republicans by nearly 20 percentage points on the issue of the economy.
“If you’re an incumbent, you get credit for things that go well, even if they’re not your fault,” Kenneth Rogoff, a professor of economics at Harvard University who studies global inflation, told ABC News. “You get blame for things when they go badly, even if it’s not your fault.”
On the campaign trail, many Republican candidates have criticized Biden and Congressional Democrats for expansive spending, which Republicans say directly led to the spike in prices. Specifically, the Democrats have faced criticism for the American Rescue Plan, a $1.9 trillion economic stimulus measure signed into law by Biden in March 2021 in response to the pandemic.
While the Biden measure comprised a major spending package, former President Donald Trump backed even greater coronavirus-related spending, signing into law a package in December 2020 worth $2.3 trillion.
Inflation appears to fuel discontent with incumbents, regardless of whether they pursue liberal or conservative policies, said Kahn of the Eurasia Group.
“There is a tendency in the American economic debate to see what’s happening in the U.S. as unique to the U.S.,” Kahn said. “It’s right to say that it’s playing out differently in the U.S. than it is elsewhere but it’s a part of the same global phenomenon.”
“In the face of a global shock, there is a vote-the-bums-out element to this,” he added. “It punishes whoever is in power, whether left or right.”
(NEW YORK) — Holiday shopping is underway and retailers have already started offering additional sales and discounts earlier than ever in an attempt to win over consumers, who are facing near-record high inflation this season.
With 73% of consumers expecting higher prices this holiday season, many are planning to buy fewer gifts compared to last year, according to a recent holiday retail survey from Deloitte.
“Inflation is at the top of every consumer’s mind. In fact, we did a study with Oracle that said that around 77% of consumers are thinking about inflation when shopping,” Hitha Herzog, chief retail analyst at The Doneger Tobe Group, told ABC News. “Retailers know that there are less dollars that are going around and less chances for them to sell to the consumer so they’re going to be very specific about making sure that the consumer shops with them.”
One strategy to win over shoppers? Convenience. Aside from prices, another major indicator consumers cited as a top factor for whether or not they will shop in-store this season is checkout speed, with 41% of shoppers listing it as important, according to a holiday consumer survey by Sensormatic Solutions.
The department store Neighborhood Goods recently adopted a new method of checkout called POS Go, a point-of-sale device by the e-commerce platform Shopify that allows customers to pay from anywhere in the store. Previously out of reach for most brands, it’s something that Shopify has recently made available to the tens of thousands of small businesses that use its platform, and consumers will likely start to see it popping up more and more inside their favorite stores.
“The modern consumer is more hybrid than ever.” Harley Finkelstein, Shopify President told ABC News. “Commerce happens everywhere, and as we head into the busiest season for our merchants, they need technology…that gives them the flexibility to meet consumers however and wherever they like to shop.”
“We’re bringing it to all of our locations now. And I think what’s been really important about it for us is that we’ve always believed from a philosophical perspective that the customer ought to be able to dictate their own terms as to how they shop,” Matt Alexander, co-founder and CEO of Neighborhood Goods, told ABC News.
Brick-and-mortar stores aren’t the only ones making the shopping experience more seamless. Online retail giant Amazon recently announced that it will be offering Venmo as a payment option, and the Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) market has become one of the fastest-growing alternatives to credit cards in the last few years. Used by hundreds of thousands of businesses, it allows consumers to pay off a purchase over a designated period of time, typically interest-free.
The number of BNPL loans in the United States grew from 16.8 million to 180 million — more than 970% — from 2019 to 2021, according to a September report from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
“One thing that retailers are doing to make sure that the customer has a very easy purchasing experience is to make sure that there are different ways that they can go ahead and pay for that product, not just in the store, but also online,” Herzog told ABC News.
“One of the biggest issues for retailers is cart abandonment and having that change of heart when you’re in the store,” Herzog added. “If there are different places to pay for things … and different methods to not abandon that cart as you are online purchasing … that will ensure that the retailers are selling the product and that the customer is having a great experiencing experience purchasing the product.”
Alexander built Neighborhood Goods with customer experience in mind, offering restaurants, refreshments and events in store for consumers to make the shopping experience unique and more enjoyable. He said the company wanted to create “a sense of magnetism to give people a really good reason to come in.”
“Even in the event of a recession, people still shop,” he said. “It’s just they’re more considerate about where they do so. And so if you can offer a really great experience, that doesn’t go out of style regardless of what’s going on in the world.”
(NEW YORK) — Supercar maker Lamborghini cannot keep up with demand.
The Italian marque said Monday it has sold 7,430 vehicles in the first nine months of the year and is on track to beat its 2021 sales record of 8,405 units.
Deliveries rose in every market — U.S., China, Japan, Germany and the U.K. — with the V10-powered Huracan seeing the largest bump in sales.
The Urus, Lamborghini’s dynamic SUV that debuted in 2018, continues to be the brand’s No. 1 model, with 4,834 units delivered to customers so far this year.
ABC News spoke with Stephan Winkelmann, the CEO of Lamborghini, about the company’s latest roadmap.
He reminisced about the “end of an era” — the company bid farewell to its lustrous 12-cylinder Aventador supercar in September — and discussed the excitement surrounding Lamborghini’s first plug-in hybrid supercar that will soon enter production at the company’s factory in Sant’Agata Bolognese, Italy.
By 2028, the company will unveil an electric supercar — a 180-degree turn from the powerful, euphonious gas-powered engines that helped make Lamborghini a success. Customers are ready for the future and so is the company, Winkelmann asserted.
The interview below has been edited and condensed for clarity:
Q: Sales have been very strong this year. Will the company surpass its sales record of 8,405 cars in 2021?
A: We will be ahead of this number for sure. We have no slowdown in sales. Every month we’re selling more cars than we’re able to deliver.
Q: Some market watchers have been calling for a global recession. Has the company seen a change in demand?
A: We have two things to protect us if a crisis is coming. One, we have an incredible order bank, which is already exceeding 18 months. Two, in the next couple of years, we’re going to renew our complete lineup. A new car always creates positive vibes in the community of super sports car lovers. So these are things that are going to help us.
Q: If someone walked into a Lamborghini dealership in the U.S. right now, is there new inventory to buy?
A: There might be some used cars…but 99.9% you won’t find a new car.
Q: Let’s talk about the company’s plans for electrification. You said the entire lineup will be hybrid by 2024. Why not a fully electric car by then?
A: Things have to be done in the right time and with the right technology. The hybrid technology for us is the best in terms of performance and also in terms of technology. We will be the first super sports car brand to have a full hybrid lineup. The first [EV] model will come by the end of this decade, around 2028. By then we think our community of customers will be ready for buying fully electric super sports cars.
Q: Will the Urus be the first hybrid since it’s the brand’s bestselling model?
A: The first hybrid car will be the follow to the Aventador, which will have a completely new V12 engine and it will be a plug-in hybrid. We’re going to present the car at the end of the first quarter of next year.
Q: Are you accepting deposits or preorders for this hybrid car?
A: Yes, we already have preorders which are close to 3,000. This means the acceptance is very high even though very few customers have seen the car. So [customers] really believe we’re doing the right thing, which is a positive sign.
Q: Lamborghini bid farewell to the Aventador last month after more than a decade of production. How did that make you feel?
A: I was present on the first day we started the project. For me, this is an end of an era which in a way is quite sad, but there are also very good memories.
Q: What would Ferruccio Lamborghini, the company’s founder, think of Lamborghini’s new direction?
A: He would be proud of the development of Lamborghini. He was a challenger of the status quo — this is exactly what we are doing. We are safeguarding the DNA of the brand and the design and also what performance is all about. We’re not selling mobility. We’re selling dreams. He would appreciate this, I think, and he would also be happy at what Lamborghini has become.
Q: Is Lamborghini still impacted by the supply crunch and chip shortage?
A: It’s a constant challenge but so far we have managed not to lose any production capacity…we’ve actually increased our production capacity. Also the war in Ukraine was affecting us a little at the beginning because we have a big supplier in Ukraine but thanks to their courage and dedication this is solved and we recovered all the delays that were happening in the first couple of days of the war. We have no major constraints in terms of the supply chain. We never had the problem of parking cars with missing parts.
Q: An all-terrain Huracan will be the company’s final send-off to the internal combustion engine. How did this idea come about?
A: In 2015, we had the idea to do an all-terrain super sports car. We are the only super sports car company with a four-wheel drive system. When I came back to Lamborghini three years ago I said, ‘Guys, I want to do this car.’ It’s the last internal combustion car we’re launching and it will be shown at Art Basel in Miami.
Q: What will production be like for the all-terrain Huracan?
A: We will communicate the number at Art Basel. It will be a limited number and this will increase the value of the car even more because it’s the first time we’re doing a car like this. You cannot go on the dunes of the desert but you can drive the car on dirt roads. It’s about ground clearance — it’s higher than a normal super sports car but not as high as an SUV. So there is a limit to this but you can take it off-road for sure.
Q: There are complaints among some in the automotive world that electric vehicles can be mechanical and not as enjoyable to drive as gas-powered sports cars. How will Lamborghini handle that challenge as the company moves forward with electrification?
A: What makes a Lamborghini a Lamborghini is the design, the performance in terms of naked numbers — lap times, top speed, acceleration — and perceived performance, or how much emotion you experience when you drive our cars. Normally electric cars are very good at longitudinal acceleration but they’re not very pleasant to drive — i.e. cornering, braking behavior, the reaction on the steering wheel. This is something we have to prove and we’re working on this before the first electric car comes to market from Lamborghini.
