Shares of the nation's largest automaker, General Motors Corp. (NYSE: GM), have been soaring in premarket despite posting a large first quarter loss, as the company surprised Wall Street by reporting a smaller than expected loss per share.
For the quarter, General Motors said it swung to a loss of $3.3 billion, hurt by continued weakness in U.S., waning demand for its sport utility vehicles, and a supplier strike. The company stated that the strike, which started two months ago at American Axle and Manufacturing Holdings Inc. (NYSE: AXL), came with charges that totaled $800 million, and slashed vehicles production by 100,000.
Weighed down by those costs, GM posted a net loss of $5.74 per share, compared with a profit of 11 cents a share a year-earlier. However, excluding one-time items, the automaker reported a loss of 62 cents per share. Going into today's earnings announcement, analysts had been expecting the company to show a much higher loss of $1.60 per share.
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