General Motors released its much anticipated 2019 third-quarter earnings report this morning. The figures shed light on how much money the automaker is making and how strong pickup sales help stave off losses from the recently settled UAW strike.

The raw financials for GM’s 3rd Quarter Boil Down To This

  • EPS-diluted of $1.60 and EPS-diluted-adjusted of $1.72, reduced by $(0.52) from UAW strike impact, and $(0.15) from Lyft and PSA revaluations.
  • Income of $2.3 billion, and revenue of $35.5 billion.
  • GM North America EBIT-adjusted of $3.0 billion.
    • Net strike impact to GMNA EBIT-adj. was $(1.0) billion, including $0.3 billion of favorable timing items.
    • North America EBIT-adj. margin of 10.8 percent driven by full-size trucks and record crossover sales.
    • GM Financial EBT-adjusted of $0.7 billion.

That’s a whole lot of financial mumbo jumbo if you’re not familiar with earnings reports. Even we have a hard time making sense of the numbers.  What does it all mean? We went searching the internet for professional opinions:

The Motley Fool Says:
“The strike idled GM’s U.S. factories for the last two weeks of the quarter (and well into October), but the impact on GM’s third-quarter result wasn’t as bad as feared: GM’s revenue of $35.5 billion and adjusted earnings per share of $1.72 both soundly beat Wall Street’s consensus estimates, thanks to strong sales of GM’s profitable crossovers and all-new pickup trucks.”

Reuters Reports:
“The Detroit-based automaker reported a 6% increase in third-quarter U.S. sales, led by its highly-profitable full-size pickup trucks, SUVs and crossovers that helped it race to a strong profit margin of almost 11% in North America. It’s that underlying business that has investors excited.”

Axios Adds:
“GM announced Tuesday that it had earned $2.3 billion in the third quarter, down 8.7%, adding that the 40-day UAW labor strike will reduce its 2019 earnings by about $2 per share — or nearly $3 billion.”

So what does that mean for you?

At the end of the day, GM is selling pickups like hotcakes. Despite the strike being a huge financial setback, the company seems well equipped to deal with the repercussions – thanks to pickup sales. Even during the strike the company’s large inventory blunted the negative effects and the company outperformed wall streets expectations.