Not So Stealth Financial Gets Shot Down

GM has paid for its financial sins already, as the stock chart shows. This is the downside of an automobile company moonlighting as a financial company. It makes you wonder how many companies who've gone into the business of issuing credit cards to boost sales are similarly exposed. More on that when I can dig into it. It the meantime, don't expect the market to forgive GM for reporting news like this. From Bloomberg: Excluding its Hughes satellite unit and one-time charges, GM's operating profit fell 36 percent, to $448 million, or 80 cents a share. Analysts, on average, had forecast GM's earnings at 67 cents a share according to Reuters Research, a unit of Reuters Group Plc. GMAC, GM's finance arm, earned $630 million, a 32 percent gain over a year ago. As with the first half of the year, much of the increase came from GMAC's mortgage business, which boosted earnings by $100 million. Earnings from GM's global automotive business fell 91 percent to $34 million. Its North American auto business earned $128 million, a 76 percent decline, as production fell 5 percent and consumer incentives rose. The results would have been worse had GM not reduced its reserves for vehicle recalls by $55 million. Pray For Us Sinners Now and at the Hour of our Death...