While it’s difficult to characterize loosing hundreds of millions of $$ “good news” this is actually a good sign for GM!
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A WALL STREET JOURNAL ONLINE NEWS ROUNDUP October 25, 2006 9:40 a.m.

General Motors Corp. reported a narrower third-quarter net loss, on an improvement in the company's North America auto operations and benefits associated with taxes.

The auto maker said Wednesday it posted a loss of $115 million, or 20 cents a share, compared with a loss of $1.66 billion, or $2.94 a share, in the year-earlier period.

The results included charges totaling $644 million, or $1.13 a share, for special items including goodwill impairment at GMAC and an increase to the charge associated with Delphi's reorganization. Excluding these items, GM reported adjusted net income of $529 million, or 93 cents a share.

Revenue rose 3.5% to $48.82 billion from $47.18 billion.

GM also narrowed the range of its estimated potential exposure to Delphi Corp.'s bankruptcy filing to between $6 billion and $7.5 billion on a pretax basis. The previous range was between $5.5 billion and $12 billion.

"Our turnaround efforts in North America and Europe are well underway, and having a large impact on the bottom line, as evidenced by the $1.6 billion improvement for the quarter," said GM Chairman and Chief Executive Rick Wagoner. "This improvement in North America and Europe, combined with the strong sales growth and earnings performance we see in Asia and Latin America, confirm that our plan is on track."

Speaking during an interview on CNBC, Mr. Wagoner said that recent results reflect the cost-cutting actions the company has taken. He acknowledged, however, that GM's global automotive business still isn't where the company wants it to be and much work is left to restore sustainable profitability.

In its global automotive operations, GM posted a narrower net loss of $62 million from $2.47 billion. The company said the better results were mainly due to significant improvement in North America, where its net loss narrowed to $374 million from $2.18 billion, despite a decrease in production. "This significant progress largely reflects improvements in structural costs, as the company executes the pension, health care and manufacturing cost reduction initiatives related to its North American turnaround plan," the company said in a statement.

GM's global market share in the quarter was 13.9%, up slightly from the second-quarter market share of 13.7%, but down from 14.4% in the year-earlier quarter. GM share in the U.S. set a stronger pace in the quarter at 25.1%, its highest quarterly result in 2006, the company said.

Earlier this month, alliance talks collapsed between GM and partners Renault SA and Nissan Motor Co., marking a victory for GM CEO Wagoner. He had been pushed to negotiate by big GM shareholder Kirk Kerkorian, who has criticized management for not taking more aggressive steps to restore the company's core North American business to profitability.

Mr. Wagoner's future at the Detroit company had been in doubt after GM reported a loss of $10.6 billion for 2005. High labor costs, coupled with declining U.S. market share, have beset the company. And matters grew even worse this year with a slump in demand for gas-guzzlers pickups and SUVs, which have been profit machines for GM and its U.S. rivals.

But GM's turnaround efforts seemed to gain traction this summer. In June, the company announced that about 35,000 hourly workers agreed to take financial incentives to leave the auto maker, allowing it to meet its job-cut target ahead of schedule and to increase its cost savings to $5 billion this year. The company's new light-truck line-up has gotten relatively good reviews, and GM has had some success in weaning car buyers off of profit-eating incentives.

Also, GM is now comparing favorably with its crosstown rivals. Earlier this week, Ford Motor Co. reported a $5.8 billion preliminary net loss for the third quarter and predicted bigger fourth-quarter operating losses.

 

GM's on a roll and their new products for 2007-2010 are very good. My concern for GM is not product related or that management isn't taking steps in the right direction, but that the retail consumer won't be in a 'big' buying mood in 2007.

Regardless, you have to give credit to GM for turning it around as well as they have.

 

"The results included charges totaling $644 million, or $1.13 a share, for special items including goodwill impairment at GMAC and an increase to the charge associated with Delphi's reorganization. Excluding these items, GM reported adjusted net income of $529 million, or 93 cents a share.

Revenue rose 3.5% to $48.82 billion from $47.18 billion."

Cool!

Good news considering the new trucks are finding their way on the streets.

 

I've complained about this before, but I'm really tired of seeing all these results "excluding special charges". Makes it seem like GM actually made a profit when they didn't (which is undoubtedly the purpose). Pretty much every US automaker has a special charge on every quarter, and when they happen that frequently they start to lose their specialness. These charges are still a result of how you run the business so stop pretending they're something beyond your control.

Just add up the numbers, tell us what the bottom line says, and stop the BS.

 

It clearly states a loss in the first couple line sof the article.
The other article in another thread was rather slanted. Its about time though. GM has taken enough crap from the media.

 

good to hear.

 

Wait...so which is it? Did GM post a loss or a gain in the 3rd?

 

Loss

 

They lost 115 million. They made 529 selling cars, but lost 644 to special stuff like GMAC and delphi.

 

It was another loss. CFO Fritz Henderson stated that GM is "still hemmoraging" and that stopping the cash burn is still a priority for this year.