The Bugatti Veyron is one of the most expensive cars in the world. Apparently, it also comes with a hefty cost to the company itself.

According to figures released by BersteinResearch, the most powerful car in the world is also a money pit for Bugatti, costing the automaker as much as &euro4 million (about $5.4 million) in losses for every Veyron sold since 2005. That’s almost an unimaginable loss.

A more staggering number is the $3 billion Bugatti will most likely end up losing once all 450 Veyrons are produced and sold off. We don’t know anybody willing to lose that much money just to prove a technological point, but it appears that this is what Bugatti — and the Volkswagen Group — signed off on when it was decided to green light the production of the Veyron eight years ago.

Some things, it turns out, are more important than financial gains, and Bugatti is proving that once again after already announcing that a successor to the Veyron is going to arrive sooner than later.

Click past the jump to read more about the most powerful Bugatti of them all, the Veyron Super Sport