General Motors post a profit for fourth quarter

US based automaker General Motors has posted a fourth-quarter net income of $950 million. This is GM’s second quarterly profit in two years.

GM gained from increased auto sales and reduced labor costs. These also helped offset the losses at their mortgage unit.

GM had last year posted losses of $6.6 billion. This latest profit figure is the company’s biggest in almost three years. GM has closed plants, laid off workers to cut costs as they are facing massive challenges from Japanese automakers in their domestic market of USA.

Efraim Levy, an equity analyst at Standard & Poor’s in New York spoke on GM’s performance: “There was a lot of progress in North America, which is their main operation. We are seeing steadying progress, but it’s not going to be in a straight line.”

GM chief executive, Rick Wagoner said: “The residential mortgage market has been a tough area over the last three, four, six months for GMAC. On the other hand, the rest of their business is pretty good.”

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