GM Slumps Despite Beating Wall Street Estimates

Semiconductor shortage or not, General Motors posted a Q3 report that handily beat the street's estimates. The automaker also offered optimism in the form of their full year guidance, stating that it would come in at the "high end" of its previous range.

Shares popped on the news before fading into red territory on worries that the shortage would persist, however.

Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas called the quarter "messy", despite the numbers, Bloomberg reported. He cited inventory, one-time items and a fourth-quarter view that seemed "slightly lower than consensus" as his reasoning. 

The company posted earnings of $1.52 per share vs. estimates of $0.96. Revenue came in at $26.78 billion versus estimates of $26.51 billion.

Here is a full overview of the company's results:

CEO Mary Barra commented: “Our third-quarter 2021 results clearly illustrate the strength of the underlying business that is funding our future, especially when you put them in the context of the calendar year."

The company attributed its solid performance to $1.1 billion in income from its financial arm, in addition to stronger vehicle pricing. Net income was $2.4 billion for the third quarter compared with $4 billion a year earlier, CNBC noted on Wednesday morning. 

The tougher YOY comp was due to Q3 of last year being the first quarter that the company's factories reopened coming out of the pandemic. According to Bloomberg, the company guided for adjusted EPS of $5.70 to $6.70, up from its previous forecast of $5.40 to $6.40.

Going forward, the automaker sees adjusted auto free cash flow of $1 billion where it previously saw $1 billion to $2 billion.

The company's shareholder letter said that GM is "well-positioned to lead the U.S. industry in full-size pickup sales for the seventh consecutive year."

Pushing further into EVs company says that next month it'll host its "grand opening of Factory ZERO in Detroit-Hamtramck, which will build the GMC HUMMER EV, the Cruise Origin and the Chevrolet Silverado EV. Factory ZERO, Orion Assembly, CAMI in Ontario and Spring Hill Assembly in Tennessee are the first traditional assembly plants we are converting to EV production."

It commented on its ongoing Bolt recall that this month, "we have begun scheduling Bolt EV and EUV battery replacements.  And to support our customers and dealers during the recall, we are restarting limited production at Orion Assembly in early November."

Additional notes from the shareholder letter:

• We will reveal the highly anticipated Chevrolet Silverado EV in January at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas. Later, Chevrolet will introduce an electric crossover priced around $30,000 that will underscore our commitment to field the best and broadest EV portfolio in the business, with entries from affordable, high-volume segments up to the top of the line.
• In 2022 and 2023, we will open battery plants in Lordstown, Ohio, and Spring Hill, which will have a combined capacity of 70 gigawatt hours.
• By 2025, we forecast that our North American EV vehicle assembly capacity will reach 20 percent and climb to 50 percent by 2030. Leveraging these established assets for EV production means we can avoid capital expenditures of about $1 billion to $1.5 billion per assembly plant, and save months or even years compared to developing an all-new site.
• Also by 2025, we will source 100-percent renewable energy to power our U.S. sites, five years earlier than our previous projection. This is the third time we've pulled ahead that target.

By Zerohedge.com

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