Big Ed heads back to Texas with millions of taxpayer dollars coming his way.
General Motors will likely delay the filing of its much-anticipated Initial Public Offering until early next week, according to numerous un-sourced media reports.
Several media outlets reported that the IPO filing, which had been expected Friday so it would follow Thursday’s announcement of GM’s big 2nd-Quarter profit, was delayed because of the allegedly sudden departure of Chairman and CEO Ed Whitacre.
Whitacre announced Thursday that he would step down as CEO on Sept first, but would remain as chairman through the end of the year. (See Ken Zino’s GM Q2 Results Tomorrow. IPO Filing Friday?, GM Posts a $14 billion Q2 Turnaround, GM CEO Whitacre Steps Down in September!)
“We’re not commenting on anything regarding the IPO,” the spokeswoman, predictably, said.
Dan Akerson, an outsider who joined the GM board in July 2009, will take over for Whitacre.
Whitacre said at the Management Briefing Seminars in Traverse City last week that the IPO is a very complicated and inches-thick document but the only time frame he would give at the time was as soon as possible.
But it appeared that the automaker had wanted to file the IPO now to take advantage of the good publicity generated by Thursday’s profit statement when the company announced 2Q profits of $1.3 billion to common stockholders. That followed the 1Q profits of $865 million.
GM expects to issue the IPO in the 4Q. Some analysts have predicted that the IPO could be the biggest in U.S. history – speculation that even Whitacre spoke of during his speech in Traverse City.
GM is now owned by the U.S. government, Canadian government and the United Autoworkers, with a small share held by bondholders of the old company. The U.S. government brokered a $50 billion deal to shepherd GM through bankruptcy and will be looking to sell part, if not all, of its 61% stake in the automaker.
Whitacre said that everyone at GM is eager to get the government out of its business and shed the moniker “Government Motors.”