Ford posts $1.4-billion 1st-quarter loss

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Ford posts $1.4-billion 1st-quarter loss

Posted Friday, Apr 24, 2009, 1:13 pm in Industry News

Ford Motor Co. today reported a smaller-than-expected loss, and said it was on track to at least break even by 2011 and reiterated that it does not expect to seek federal funding, the Detroit Free Press reported.

For the first three months of the year, Ford lost $1.4 billion or 60 cents per share, compared with earnings of $70 million, or 3 cents per share a year ago, the story said. Analysts had expected Ford to report a loss of $2.8 billion, or $1.24 per share, according to the consensus estimate of 14 analysts surveyed by Thomson One Analytics. But for several years, Ford has made it a habit to report surprisingly good first-quarter results, only to disappoint later, the Free Press said.

For the first quarter of this year, Ford said its total revenue for the first quarter was $24.8 billion, down 37 percent from $39.2 billion for the same period last year. Most of that revenue decline is due to a global recession that has caused the industry’s sales of cars and trucks to decline 38.4 percent so far this year in the United States, the paper said.

According to the Free Press, Ford still managed to cut its rate of cash consumption, a major concern among analysts, during the first quarter. During the first quarter, Ford said it burned through $3.2 billion in cash for its automotive operations, down from $6.6 billion during the fourth quarter of last year and said that as of March 31, it had $21.3 billion in automotive cash, the story said. (Detroit Free Press)