Arithmetic and General Motors; Just Too Many Zeros
General Motors just doesn't get the fact that they're in the wrong century for a rebound.
It’s nice to have a nest-egg of course and it’s a comfort no doubt for GM’s pensioners and health care dependents that the end isn’t imminent.
Having said that, the piper must be paid and the most General thing that can be said about the Motors company is that it’s operating in the wrong decade; product, engine and consumer-wise. Across brands, product is redundant, the lines of difference between marques so blurred as to be non-existent. Chevrolet and GMC, both marketing the same SUV? Oh, come now.
Engine-wise the GM bread and butter is big V-8s, even as Toyota takes over as American #2 carmaker from Ford by building small and elegant. Consumer-wise, the numbers are less clear, but lead times are overlong in the auto business and GM looks to be on the wrong side of that equation as well.
The company lost a bundle in its second quarter even as it became profitable for the first time in a long string …