General Motors Round Up

I've been swamped with non-blogging duties all day. And am just now, after midnight here on the US east coast, able to come up for air (when I should be going to bed).

Anyway, while the big news today was the state of the American (and global) financial system, the big news around these parts surely included General Motors (GM/NYSE). Which is suspending its dividend. You might recall it previously cut the dividend in half, but it remained a nice payout.

Here's The Wall Street Journal article on GM, which is co-authored by John D. Stoll, who has consistently done fine reporting on GM over time.

The Lex Column, a venerable feature of the Financial Times, is always worth reading at times like these.

If you don't subscribe to either the WSJ.com or FT.com, you might want to read the Bloomberg wrap-up by Greg Bensinger and Jeff Green. In addition to events of the last day, the article gives a good overview of GM's recent history.

It's a busy week, in more ways than one.

Comments

[Sivaram Velauthapillai]

Have you changed your opinion of GM since you first invested? Or has it mostly unfolded kind of how you expected (i.e. tough lingering problems)? I don't follow GM closely but every time I look at it, I have no idea if it took 2 steps forward with 1 step back, or if it keeps taking 2 steps back and 1 step forward...

[John]

Sivaram: I thought it would be a long-term turnaround, with ups and downs along the way. Though when it was more than $40 a share last year I can't say I saw it going this low. But when it became obvious some months ago that we were having an economic downturn (whether it qualifies as a recession is a question for academics), I knew it was get knocked down...and I was prepared to hold it through to the next economic upturn. (Ditto for everything I own, especially the retail stocks -- AEO, FL and ODP.)

So I'm happy to hold -- and I think Rick Wagoner and especially Bob Lutz are doing fine jobs.