GM Reports Record Car Sales

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GM Reports Record Car Sales

February 22, 2012

General Motors (GM), the US car giant, have posted record profits for 2011, in spite of huge losses in its European operations.

GM made a record profit of $7.6 billion (£4.85 billion) for the whole of 2011 - this is a reported 62% increase on 2010. Sales rose by 7.6% last year to over 9 million cars.

Back in 2008 the US government were forced to bail GM out by as much as $50 billion as they risked bankruptcy. As a result the US government now own 32% of the company.

In spite of this good news for the company the future of the European motor market looked dire with GM losing $700 million in revenue. This includes their Vauxhall plants in Luton and Ellesmere Port (the manufacturing plants that make the Astra estate, hatchback and van models).

According to the report the majority of the company's profits came from American and Canadian car insurance policy holders.

GM's Chief Financial Officer, Dan Amman, commented:

"Behind the scenes, we are working hard to eliminate complexity and cost throughout the organisation to increase margins in all of our regions and return Europe and South America to profitability."

Source: http://media.gm.com/media/us/en/gm/news.detail.html/content/Pages/news/emergency_news/0216_4Q_earnings