April 22 (Bloomberg) -- Chief Executive Officer Jeffrey Immelt said he will resist calls to shrink General Electric Co. beyond an existing plan for reducing the company's consumer businesses in slowing economies.

``There are more reviews and intensity, but no real change to the strategy,'' Immelt said in an interview in advance of tomorrow's annual meeting, his first face-to-face meeting with investors since this month's surprise drop in profit. ``The strategy remains intact.''

GE shares fell the most in two decades on April 11, when Immelt reported a 12 percent decline in first-quarter earnings and said annual profit would trail his $2.42-a- share target. The profit miss, which he blamed mainly on credit-market turmoil, renewed analysts' calls for GE to sell off larger chunks of the company such as NBC Universal or consumer- finance unit GE Money.

``It goes back to: Long-term, is the strategic direction that GE's going the right one?'' said Stephen Hoedt, an analyst at National City Corp. in Cleveland, which owns about 17 million GE shares. The mix of finance and non-finance units ``is something that a few people have been concerned about for a long time, and something that we're going to have to review periodically.''

Fairfield, Connecticut-based GE fell 13 cents to $32.33 at 4 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares have dropped 8 percent in 12 months and 18 percent since Immelt, 52, took over from Jack Welch in September 2001.

First-Quarter Surprise

GE on April 11 predicted profit of $2.20 to $2.30 a share for 2008. First-quarter profit from continuing operations fell to $4.36 billion, or 44 cents a share, missing the 51-cent average estimate in a Bloomberg survey of analysts.

Financial market turmoil cut the value of some investments and thwarted end-of-quarter commercial real estate deals, GE said, causing about 5 cents of the 7 cents drop below the estimates.

``We've sold some of the property that got pushed into April,'' Immelt said in the interview yesterday in New York, where he spoke at an Edison Foundation energy conference. ``The capital markets remain challenging. We think advising caution is a smart move.''

For analysts including Citigroup Inc.'s Jeffrey Sprague in New York, caution would include simplifying GE and reducing its financial businesses as a percentage of the total.

A year ago, Citigroup's Sprague suggested selling GE Money; NBC Universal television, film and media unit; and the real estate divisions. ``We believe the evidence is mounting that GE is too big and complex to manage effectively,'' Sprague said in an April 11 note.

Immelt Strategy

In his tenure as CEO, Immelt has sold units with annual sales of about $50 billion, such as insurance and plastics, and protected GE's AAA credit rating while spending more than $70 billion to build higher-return areas such as power generation, aviation and commercial finance. He has been shrinking GE Money and is seeking a buyer or partner for its U.S. consumer credit- card unit. Immelt has said he's keeping NBC.

``This first-quarter result is unfortunate in that it's taking away from the operational traction they've reported in a number of businesses of late,'' said Robert Spremulli, an analyst at TIAA-CREF in New York, which owns more than 74 million GE shares.

GE's finance businesses accounted for 44 percent of net income and 53 percent of profit from continuing operations last year, according to its annual U.S. Securities and Exchange filings.

Half the Business

Investors want Immelt to keep GE's finance units below half of profit and sales in part because industrial companies have higher stock market values than banks. GE Infrastructure, the biggest segment and the world's largest maker of jet engines and locomotives, beat the company's revenue forecast in the first quarter with a 17 percent profit gain.

``We've got very strong growth in infrastructure,'' Immelt said in the interview. ``My belief is that making industrial greater than 50 percent of the company is going to take care of itself, just given the strength of some of those industrial businesses and the ongoing portfolio action we've taken in financial services.''

-- Editors: Kevin Miller, Joe Winski

To contact the reporter on this story: Rachel Layne in Boston at rlayne@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: April 22, 2008 16:06 EDT