GM shares close 3.6 percent up; Obama says bailout worked
By Jia Lynn Yang and William Branigin
WashPost
President Obama, declaring that the U.S. auto industry "is once again on the rise," hailed General Motors' public stock offering Thursday as a vindication of his bailout program and the "tough restructuring" that resulted from it.
In brief remarks at the White House, Obama said GM's relaunch as a public company cuts the government's stake in the largest U.S. automaker by nearly half.
"American taxpayers are now positioned to recover more than my administration invested in GM," he said. U.S. automakers "are in the midst of their strongest period of job growth in more than a decade," Obama said, adding that "for the first time in six years, Ford, GM and Chyrsler are operating at a profit."
While there is "still a long road ahead," the president said, "we are finally beginning to see some of these tough decisions ... pay off."
(More here.)
WashPost
President Obama, declaring that the U.S. auto industry "is once again on the rise," hailed General Motors' public stock offering Thursday as a vindication of his bailout program and the "tough restructuring" that resulted from it.
In brief remarks at the White House, Obama said GM's relaunch as a public company cuts the government's stake in the largest U.S. automaker by nearly half.
"American taxpayers are now positioned to recover more than my administration invested in GM," he said. U.S. automakers "are in the midst of their strongest period of job growth in more than a decade," Obama said, adding that "for the first time in six years, Ford, GM and Chyrsler are operating at a profit."
While there is "still a long road ahead," the president said, "we are finally beginning to see some of these tough decisions ... pay off."
(More here.)
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1 Comments:
has the government sold it's shares yet? As of Nov 19, they hadn't. Only when the stock price reaches ~$50 AND the government sells with the treasury get it's money back.
And, should GM go to bankruptcy again, are we assured, then, that we will not have to endure yet another bailout?
remember, we bailed out Chrsyler 30 years ago. They were only able to return to profitability by renegotiating it's debt at a major loss to investors, laying off over 50,000 employees and closing countless plants. By the early 1990's, what was left of Chrysler was sold off to Daimler who similarly could not make the company profitable. Daimler, in turn, sold it for pennies on the dollar to private equity firms who got shafted in 2009 in Chrysler's bankruptcy when the Obama Administration, having deemed the bankruptcy laws as negotiable (remember if we have a 'living' Constitution, we shouldn't be surprised that we also have a 'living' bankruptcy law, too) handed the company over to the unions.
I don't think we can really say with any confidence that the GM bailout 'worked'. the government still holds the $50 billion dollar loan which has not been paid back.
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