Welcome to today's edition of the Daily 5.
It's hard to believe General Motors CEO Mary Barra has been leading the automaker for nearly 11 years now, at least for veteran industry watchers who witnessed the revolving door of CEOs atop this company less than 20 years ago. Today, GM is about as stable as a global automaker can be — relative to the environment in which it competes.
This week, we are honoring Barra as the 2024 Automotive News All-Stars Industry Leader of the Year. She earned it.
It's hard to find a significant metric showing GM is doing worse this year than last:
• The stock price as of last week's close was up 62 percent year to date (and up 2.8 percent today to close at $60.20, see chart below).
• Net income improved 12 percent to $8.9 billion through the first nine months. This despite significantly higher North American labor costs stemming from new contracts with the UAW in the U.S. and Unifor in Canada. GM has raised its earnings guidance three times this year.
• It's an unscientific statistic that speaks to quality, but GM's 31 U.S. recalls filed with NHTSA this year are half that of its two Detroit rivals, Stellantis and Ford, which each have issued 62 callbacks so far in 2024. BMW has recorded 34 recalls.
• GM improved its supplier relations score, according to Plante Moran's annual automaker-supplier working relations index study.
Of course, Barra and GM didn't have a perfect year. The Nov. 15 layoff of about 1,000 employees was poorly handled and badly timed. But CEOs don't win popularity contests by adhering to their fiduciary responsibilities to shareholders.
Still, given GM's overall performance this year versus many of its competitors, Barra is the clear winner of this award.
In other news today, Reuters reported on President-elect Donald Trump's transition plans for energy. As expected, they would be favorable to oil, gasoline, coal and traditional energy companies.
In a related matter, California Gov. Gavin Newsom is promising to step in with a state electric car tax credit if Trump repeals a federal subsidy after he takes office in January, Bloomberg reported. The widely anticipated repeal would likely hurt startup EV makers Lucid Group and Rivian Automotive Inc., Laurence Iliff reported today.
Something else to check out in today's report: Our "Daily Drive" podcast features an exclusive interview with incoming Hyundai global CEO Jose Muñoz, who discusses his new position and his plans for the automaker moving forward.
Looking ahead to Tuesday, we'll have a story about how autonomous vehicle developers are looking forward to working with the new administration on moving ahead with robotaxis and self-driving vehicles.
That's it for today. Have a great rest of your day.
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— Philip Nussel, online editor
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