General Motors Said to Aim for Up to $16 Billion in Stock Sale
General Motors Co. (GM) GMC vehicle
Jim R. Bounds/Bloomberg
General Motors Co. (GM) GMC vehicles sit on display at a dealership in Raleigh, North Carolina.
General Motors Co. (GM) GMC vehicles sit on display at a dealership in Raleigh, North Carolina. Photographer: Jim R. Bounds/Bloomberg
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Bloomberg's Jeff Green talks about the likelihood and timing of an initial public offering by General Motors Co. Green speaks with Margaret Brennan on Bloomberg Television's "InBusiness." (Source: Bloomberg)
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Rebecca Lindland, an analyst at IHS Automotive, talks with Bloomberg's Julie Hyman about the leadership change at General Motors Co. and prospects for an initial public offering by the company. GM Chief Executive Officer Ed Whitacre, who led the largest U.S. automaker from bankruptcy to two straight profitable quarters, will step down as CEO on Sept. 1 and be replaced by director Dan Akerson. (Source: Bloomberg)
Aug. 12 (Bloomberg) -- Jessica Caldwell, senior analyst at Edmunds.com, talks about General Motors Co. Chief Executive Officer Ed Whitacre's decision to relinquish his CEO post and the outlook for an initial public offering by the company. Whitacre will step down on Sept. 1 and be replaced by Dan Akerson, a member of GM's board of directors. Caldwell also discusses the U.S. government's ownership of GM. She talks with Carol Massar and Matt Miller on Bloomberg Television's "Street Smart." Bloomberg's Jeff Green also speaks. (Source: Bloomberg)
July 30 (Bloomberg) -- Ron Bloom, senior counselor to the U.S. Treasury on manufacturing policy, discusses the government's rescue of the automobile industry and the outlook for an initial public offering of shares in General Motors Co. President Barack Obama travels to the Detroit area today to visit a Chrysler plant and a GM facility that are adding production. Bloom speaks with Deirdre Bolton on Bloomberg Television’s “InsideTrack.” (Source: Bloomberg)
July 30 (Bloomberg) -- Jeffrey Schuster, executive director of global forecasting at J.D. Power & Associates, discusses the outlook for the U.S. auto industry and the prospects of an initial public offering by General Motors Co. President Barack Obama travels to the Detroit area today to visit a Chrysler plant and a GM facility that are adding production. Schuster speaks with Carol Massar on Bloomberg Television’s “In the Loop With Betty Liu.” (Source: Bloomberg)
Aug. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Reuben Munger, chief executive officer of Bright Automotive Inc., talks with Bloomberg's Julie Hyman about his company's funding agreement with General Motors Co. Munger also discusses his company's vehicle design and development costs. (Source: Bloomberg)
General Motors Co., the automaker 61 percent owned by the U.S., is seeking to raise $12 billion to $16 billion in an initial public offering, said a person familiar with the plan.
The more than 500-page document, called an S-1, is likely to be filed tomorrow, though it may not happen until Monday, said the person, who asked not to be named because the discussions are private. The exact value of the offering may not be fully detailed in the registration statement filed with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, said the person.
The IPO would be the second-largest in U.S. history, behind Visa Inc.’s $19.7 billion initial offering in March 2008. The share sale is also the first step in freeing the Detroit-based automaker from government ownership, which Chief Executive Officer Ed Whitacre has pushed for after GM’s $50 billion taxpayer bailout in the wake of its bankruptcy in June 2009.
“After the restructuring, I expect GM to once again be a leading company on the U.S. stock market,” said Kim Yong Tae, who helps manage $2.9 billion equivalent of assets at Yurie Asset Management Co. in Seoul. “The U.S. government has shown a strong will to revive GM. It’s a stock I want to add to my portfolio.”
Whitacre will be succeeded as CEO by director Dan Akerson on Sept. 1 and as chairman at the end of the year, GM said today.
Credit Line
GM has obtained a $5 billion revolving line of credit from a group of at least 15 banks as of last night New York time, said the person. More than half are named in the draft of the document as underwriters, including Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citigroup Inc., Bank of America Corp. and Credit Suisse Group AG.
Selim Bingol, a GM spokesman, declined to comment on details of the IPO.
“We will do an IPO when conditions are right for the company and in the markets,” he said in an e-mail.
GM today reported second-quarter net income of $1.54 billion on higher sales in the U.S. and China. Earnings before interest and taxes climbed to $2.03 billion from $1.82 in the first three months of the year, the company said in a statement. Revenue rose 44 percent from a year ago to $33.2 billion.
The company reported $1.07 billion in first-quarter profit in May, compared with a $5.98 billion loss a year earlier.
Most of the shares offered would come from the U.S. Treasury, the person said. The aim is to sell a fifth of the government’s 304 million shares, two people familiar with the plan said in June. That would reduce the Treasury’s holdings to less than 50 percent.
New Shares
The automaker may sell a small number of new shares, the person familiar with the plans said yesterday. The Canadian government, the United Auto Workers union’s retiree medical trust and the estate of the bankrupt predecessor General Motors Corp. haven’t decided whether to participate in the IPO, the person said.
The document will describe the old GM, its restructuring in bankruptcy and liabilities facing the new company, the person said.
GM reported its second quarter profit today, and industry analysts are looking for strong results to set the stage for the IPO even as consumer confidence wanes.
“GM needs to be very careful about when to conduct the IPO,” said Yuuki Sakurai, chief executive officer of Fukoku Capital Management in Tokyo. “Can they convince investors to buy shares when spending is dropping in the U.S. and they don’t have leading-edge environmental technology?”
Chevrolet Volt
The largest U.S. automaker will introduce its Chevrolet Volt electric-drive car later this year. The vehicle will compete with models including Nissan Motor Co.’s Leaf electric car and a planned plug-in version of Toyota Motor Corp.’s Prius hybrid.
General Motors Corp. filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on June 1, 2009, after posting $88 billion of losses since 2004, the last year the company reported an annual profit. General Motors Co. emerged 39 days later.
Executives responded today to investor concerns about when the company will break even in its European business, which lost $666 million before interest and taxes in the first half, and who will succeed Whitacre.
Confidence in Europe
The automaker expects to break even in Europe next year, Chris Liddell, chief financial officer, said during an interview on Bloomberg Television’s “In the Loop.”
“We still have confidence that we can achieve, let’s say, break-even in Europe by next year and then profitability thereafterwards,” he said. “We’re closing a plant. We’re looking at changes in employee relationships, which will lower our costs, and looking to really invest in the product range, as well. That’s been very successful, that formula, here in North America.”
The other question is the company’s succession plan. The company had not said who would lead GM after Whitacre, 68, retires. Now that has been resolved.
“Dan Akerson is one of the most exceptional executives in the country and will serve both GM’s interests and our national interest well,” said William E. Conway Jr., a founder of the Carlyle Group, where Akerson had been a managing director. “He has played an incredibly valuable role at Carlyle. We will miss him.”
To contact the reporters on this story: Jeffrey McCracken in New York at jmccracken3@bloomberg.net; Tim Higgins in Southfield, Michigan at Thiggins21@bloomberg.net
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