Normally at CarThrottle we don’t do a whole lot of covering the usual industry news, but this announcement is pretty notable. As the financial crisis forced General Motors and Chrysler into taking government loans and going through bankruptcy, Ford has remained a notable exception to that.
When Chief Executive Officer Alan Mulally came to the company, he put all of the company’s assets on the line to secure loans to turnaround the company. That turned out to be a smart move, providing Ford with the funds to weather the economic crisis.
There have been worries though that the cash hoard wouldn’t be enough to last the company if losses continued. Those fears are being quelled with actual results. Here is some of the statistics: net income of $997 million and pretax profit of $1.1 billion for starters. A huge fact is Ford North America has turned from red to black, posting a $357 million profit (the first since 2005!).
There is an even more important metric still: overall cash available is up $2.8 billion, to $23.8 billion. That number is important, because it serves as a cushion in case everything doesn’t go according to plans. Another $1 billion in structural costs were also cut this quarter.
Ford still isn’t predicting consistent profits until 2011 but I’d say they are well on their way to achieving that if we continue to see results like this.
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