General Motors Company (GM) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good morning, and welcome to the General Motors Business Update Conference Call. [Operator Instructions] As a reminder, this conference call is being recorded, Wednesday, November 29, 2023. I would now like to turn the conference over to Ashish Kohli, GM's Vice President of Investor Relations.

Thanks, Amanda, and good morning, everyone. We apologize for the technical delays. We appreciate you joining us for a brief update on our business. The conference call materials were issued this morning and are available on GM's Investor Relation website. We are also broadcasting this call via webcast. Joining us today are Mary Barra, GM's Chair and CEO; and Paul Jacobson, GM's Executive Vice President and CFO. On today's call, management will make forward-looking statements about our expectations. These statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially. These risks and uncertainties include the factors identified in our filings with the SEC. Please review the safe harbor statement on the first page of our presentation, that the content of our call will be governed by this language. And with that, I'm delighted to turn the call over to Mary.

Thanks, Ashish, and thank you all for joining us. We appreciate the opportunity to update you on the business, including our insights on our new labor contracts and the announcement that we will return $10 billion of capital to our owners and raise our common stock dividend by 33% as part of our capital allocation framework. But before I turn the call over to Paul to provide an updated 2023 earnings guidance and some early directional comments on 2024, I wanted to share my perspective on the journey to an all-electric future and put recent events into context. First, there is no question that the future of General Motors is an all-electric and technology-centric future. Not just because it's the right thing to do for the environment and society, it's also a very good business. Electric vehicles and software, and the new business opportunities they are creating, are key to unlocking growth in revenues, market share and profitability. Although the rate of growth has slowed recently, EV demand is clearly moving in the right direction. EV sales in the U.S. are on track to surpass 1 million units for the first time this year, which is about 7% of the total market. And there's really no reason that EV demand won't be higher in the years ahead. Consideration is rising, the policy environment is favorable, the public charging infrastructure is growing and customer choice is expanding. I am disappointed with our Ultium-based EV production in 2023. As you know, we have had difficulties with battery module assembly. However, we have made substantial improvements, both to the process and to the organization responsible for this work. And in 2024, we expect significantly higher Ultium EV production and significant improvement -- improved EV margins. If you look back, we spent years preparing the company for this transformation, and our long-term EV profitability and margin goals remain intact despite the recent headwinds. Because we started this journey earlier, we are much farther along than the market is giving us credit for. We fixed or exited underperforming businesses to free up capital. We optimized our ICE vehicle portfolio to grow share in high-volume and high-margin segments. We developed the Ultium platform so we can provide purpose-built EVs at scale, with high levels of commonality which also drives capital efficiency. And our module production issue is not really related to Ultium. As I've said before, it is really an automation -- manufacturing automation issue. We are securing our supply chain for EV raw materials and making strategic investments to lock in favorable commercial terms. We are vertically integrating domestic cell production to reduce costs as we scale. And we're reducing our fixed costs and the capital intensity of our business. And the fact of the matter, this work will really never stop. We will continue to optimize. We are also addressing the challenges at Cruise. What Cruise has accomplished over the past 8 years since we acquired the company is remarkable. Our priority now is to refocus them on safety, transparency and accountability and build trust with regulators at the local, state and federal levels, including first responders and the communities in which we will operate. This includes making improvements driven by an independent safety and incident review that are underway. We will share more details on the path forward in the coming weeks when we have all the findings and recommendations, but we expect the pace of Cruise expansion to be more deliberate when operations resume, and spending will be substantially lower in 2024 than it was in 2023. As all of you know, the GM team -- well, you should appreciate the fact that we do not hesitate to address our challenges head on while we're pursuing our strategy. That's why our stock price is disappointing to everyone. At $28 per share, our stock price remains 15% below our IPO price. We are at our lowest P/E multiple since our IPO and 2.5x below our historic average multiplier. Our stock is trading $14 per share below the median sell-side analyst target price of $42, representing a 49 upside to the current level. And despite continued free cash flow outperformance, our share price has declined more than 50% from January 2022. Cash flow has been strong. In fact, it's been very strong. From the beginning of 2022 through the end of '23, we will have generated more than $21 billion in adjusted automotive free cash flow, and we now have returned $14.2 billion in dividends and buybacks to shareholders over the period. We know the cost of our new labor agreements have been a concern for investors and a drag on our stock. Like you, we watched the labor market closely as large manufacturing companies, like John Deere, Caterpillar and Mack Trucks as well as UPS, negotiated double-digit wage increases and other benefits with their unions. So we built conservative expectations into our long-term projections. The net result was higher than we anticipated, but not significantly. We estimate the new contracts that we have in place with the UAW and Unifor will increase our labor costs in North America by about $500 per vehicle in 2024 and about $575 on average over the life of the contracts. In addition, the labor contracts at Ultium Cells will increase our cell costs by about $3 per kilowatt hour. Importantly though, our nonunion competitors, including Honda, Toyota, Hyundai, Nissan and others, are significantly increasing wages as we expected, so the same relative gap is being restored. As we look to next year, we are finalizing our 2024 budget that will fully offset the incremental cost of the contract. Offsetting higher labor costs and meeting our financial targets will require us to continue reducing capital intensity of the business, developing products even more efficiently and further reducing our fixed and variable costs, and this work is already in process. Specifically, we will continue to execute our $2 billion net fixed cost reduction program by the end of 2024. This includes lower salary people costs, lower marketing expense and additional overhead reductions. Our Winning with Simplicity initiative is already reducing design and engineering expense, supplier costs, order complexity, buildable combinations and manufacturing complexity. We'll have more to say at our Investor Day in March, but the benefits will be material in 2024, and we expect to avoid spending hundreds of millions of dollars on a go-forward basis by going to market with a portfolio of brands and vehicles that are optimized to satisfy both customers and our shareholders. Already, we've launched several new ICE SUVs that deliver great design, technology and performance for our customers, and are more profitable than the models they replace. In our EV business, we continue to scale production in North America at Factory ZERO, Spring Hill and in Ramos Arizpe to meet growing demand for EVs. At BrightDrop next year, we will see the launch of a module assembly line at CAMI, the scaling of Zevo 400 production and the new enterprise-wide efficiencies that are now -- that now the business is more closely integrated into our product development organization and GM Envolve. This was a very major step that we took to make sure we had BrightDrop fully integrated, and it drove significant efficiencies. From a capital standpoint, we will prepare for many growth scenarios because Factory ZERO can flex between different EV products, and we have flexibility at Ramos Arizpe and Spring Hill to toggle between ICE and EV production. At the same time, we are deferring or slowing other investments to optimize capital spending as the EV market continues to evolve. This includes our decision to push back the reopening of the Orion Assembly plant, which will significantly expand our EV truck capacity to late 2025. We made this decision because we saw an opportunity to incorporate changes that will materially improve the profitability as we scale, and we have opportunity to grow at Factory ZERO to meet customer demand. Our product and manufacturing teams have already started implementing more than 30 technology improvements at our Orion Assembly plant for that product, which will optimize manufacturing for quality and efficiency. And in addition, more than 100 build stations will have improved designs, and we're making progress every day on other plant layout, process and throughput improvements. Capital efficiency and profitability also drove our decision to develop the next-generation Chevrolet Bolt EV, instead of a new portfolio that was anticipated to cost $5 billion in the future capital forecast. As a result of these decisions, we're reducing our medium-term capital spending to $11 billion to $12 billion from $11 billion to $13 billion, and we are continuing to assess all future expenditures. We'll provide an update early next year. Regarding the capital investments covered in our contract with the UAW, I'd like to clarify that about 85% of them were previously announced and already factored into our long-term capital plan; about 70% are allocated to support EV production; and the balance support ICE programs, including our high-margin full-size trucks and SUVs. We are doing all of this to help meet our 2025 profitability targets for both our EV business and our overall North America business, which brings us back to capital allocation. Now that we have a ratified contract and a clear path forward that includes greater operating and investment efficiency, we can resume returning excess capital to shareholders per our plan. Short-term bumps in the road aside, we are confident in our ability to continue to generate significant free cash flow as we transition to an all-electric future, and we're very optimistic and excited about the road ahead. So I want to thank you, and now I'll turn the call over to Paul before we go into Q&A.

Thank you, Mary, and good morning, everyone. Thanks for taking the time to join us. We are just weeks away from the end of another challenging but rewarding year. And while slower than we would like, we are making progress on our EV transition and fundamentally strengthening the company. Mary noted our plan to return excess cash to shareholders through the accelerated share repurchase program, now that we have moved past the risk of an extended labor stoppage and have more certainty in our future costs. We have a balanced capital allocation framework and have confidence that our future operating performance will allow us to consistently return excess free cash flow to shareholders. We expect and intend to remain at or favorable to our stated framework liquidity and leverage targets following the execution of this ASR. But before we get into the details of the strike impact and reinstated guidance, I'm pleased to share that our underlying business continues to perform well into the fourth quarter. We continue to see the U.S. industry run at around a 16 million unit total SAAR, fairly consistent year-to-date and well above our initial estimates of 15 million at the beginning of the year. J.D. Power PIN data highlighted steady pricing in October compared to Q3, with GM incentives continuing to outperform the industry average. We have seen incentives increase slightly in November, but we do remain well below the industry average. So let's talk about the impact of the strike. We estimate the total EBIT-adjusted impact in 2023 to be around $1.1 billion, with only a small portion of the losses expected to be recovered this year due to timing and capacity constraints. The EBIT-adjusted impact was driven by an estimated loss of approximately 95,000 units of production. The Chevrolet Colorado and GMC Canyon midsize pickups, as well as the Chevrolet Traverse and Buick Enclave large crossovers, were the most affected, but are now running at pre-strike levels. Additionally, we experienced a disruption of more than 5 weeks at our parts and accessories distribution centers. So let's look ahead to the rest of the year and our reinstated guidance. On our Q3 earnings call, we indicated that we were trending towards the upper half of our $12 billion to $14 billion guidance range prior to the strike, with the strength of the underlying business resulting in guidance raises in both Q1 and Q2. We continue to see this momentum and are reinstating our full year guidance to EBIT-adjusted in the $11.7 billion to $12.7 billion range; EPS-diluted-adjusted to the $7.20 to $7.70 range, including the estimated impact of the ASR; adjusted automotive free cash flow in the $10.5 billion to $11.5 billion range; and capital spend of $11 billion to $11.5 billion. To be clear, this updated guidance includes the $1.1 billion EBIT-adjusted strike impact in Q3 and Q4. The cost of the ratification bonus and other elements of the new contract are largely offset in Q4. EPS diluted adjusted also includes the benefit of a lower effective tax rate in the 15% to 17% range, due primarily to the impact of the strike and a mix of global earnings. Through Q3, we generated more than $10 billion of adjusted automotive free cash flow. Even while factoring in the strike impact and the ratification bonus, we expect Q4 adjusted automotive free cash flow to be slightly positive. For capital spend, we now anticipate the full year to be at the low end of our original guidance range, driven by previously announced program deferrals and more efficient spending [ to our -- ] execute our portfolio. We made some capital commitments in the UAW contract. However, it's important to note these are focused on facilities that we had already planned to invest in. In summary, when you look back over the last few years, we've consistently tackled headwinds, coming out stronger on the other side. The higher labor cost is no exception, which is why we are putting in place several initiatives to more than offset the higher costs in the coming years. The fixed cost reductions that we announced earlier were a proactive start. And in Q3, we realized $500 million of gross savings year-over-year from lower marketing, engineering spend and people costs, and we expect to realize another $500 million in Q4. As we look to 2024, we expect the U.S. industry to run consistently around a 16 million total SAAR and believe our company's core auto operations and cash flow will remain resilient. Directionally speaking, we anticipate North America labor cost to be up about $1.5 billion versus the prior contracts, but most of this was already included into our forward projections. Our expectation is that the fixed cost initiative, plus the benefits of winning with simplicity, will more than offset the higher labor costs next year. We also assume pricing will moderate, and mix headwinds from higher EV volume. However, we anticipate tailwinds from the strength of our ICE portfolio, more clean energy tax credits, a materially lower Cruise spend and nonrecurrence of the LG agreement and strike impacts. We'll provide the official guidance on our Q4 earnings call. Also tomorrow at an investor conference, we will provide additional detail on our path from negative EV margins today to achieving our mid-single-digit profitability margin targets in 2025, including IRA benefits. The bottom line is that we are focusing on a strong product portfolio which is fundamental to our success. And when you combine it with the efficiency initiatives that are being implemented, we believe these give us the opportunity to have a strong 2024 and continue the momentum we've created. This concludes our opening comments, and we'll now move to the Q&A portion of the call.

[Operator Instructions] Our first question comes from the line of Rod Lache with Wolfe Research.

Thanks for hosting this call. I think first, I'd like to just clarify the $2 billion net cost reduction. Can you talk a little bit about what that would look like or just clarify what that would look like incrementally from a gross cost perspective looking out to 2024? Maybe also add some color on the magnitude of the adjustments to spending at Cruise that you alluded to. And in the past, you talked about $18 billion cash and $30 billion to $35 billion liquidity as appropriate for the company. Is that still correct?

Yes, Rod, sorry, there's a lot to unpack there. So I'll just -- I'll start from the back end. Yes, the $18 billion is expected to remain intact for now. As we've seen strengthening in the balance sheet and strengthening in the cash flow, we'll continue to evaluate that. But after giving effect to this transaction, we still expect to be in about the $20 billion range of liquidity, not counting all of our credit facilities, but including the $3 billion credit facility we instituted as part of this transaction. As to Cruise, I think Mary can comment as well. But we're continuing to look through the independent review of Cruise and the incident. And as you've seen and as we've said, we are projecting to have a little bit of a narrower scope as we focus in on safety and scaling up in a much narrower view than we were. As a result of that, we expect that the spend at Cruise will be down hundreds of millions of dollars in '24 from 2023. And there's more to come on that as we continue to work through the analysis. For the fixed cost side of it, the $2 billion fixed cost program was aimed at marketing, administrative and other fixed costs. We didn't include labor in there, primarily because we knew the impact of the new contract was going to be in there. So the $2 billion -- and we can get the team and we'll publish something that shows the reconciliation of that. But all those categories, we expect will be flat in 2024 versus 2022.

And Rod, if I could just add a little bit more about Cruise. As Paul said, we're doing an independent review of the incident as well as doing a comprehensive independent review of the safety and the technology. And if you step back, we have an incredibly talented team at Cruise and the work they've done and where they've gotten the technology to is remarkable. But as we go forward, we're also finding synergies. With Mike Abbott joining from a software perspective, we found areas where we're going to have synergies between the work General Motors is doing and Cruise that's also going to allow us to be more efficient from an overall budget spend. And then as Paul said, as -- after we get the results of these 2 independent reviews, we will chart the course forward. But because we're going to be very deliberate about how we go forward and demonstrate, to start with, as was stated last week, in one city. To demonstrate we have the right relationship and have built trust with regulators, with first responders, with the community, while providing an exceptional experience to the consumer, we think getting back to scale and demonstrating the model is going to be very important. So that path, that will be guided by the results of our independent reviews, will lead us to be able to be more efficient.

Mary, I understand what you're saying about safety and Cruise, and that makes a lot of sense. I'm curious if you've adjusted your views on the scale of what you intend to build, or the capital intensity, as you're sort of thinking about the go-forward plan for that business.

Again, I think, yes, I wouldn't say it changed. I would say there was already work going of how we could drive it to be much more capital-efficient. But I think, Rod, before I give a complete outlook on where we see Cruise going by middle of the decade and by 2030, I want to have the results of the independent review in front of me. And with that, I think we'll be able to be very clear about where we're expecting to go.

Our next question comes from Itay Michaeli with Citi.

Thank you for hosting the call. Just 2 quick clarifications. First would be the cost offsets you outlined for the labor contracts. I want to clarify that you're kind of confirming the 8% to 10% GMNA margin target through 2025. And second, I was hoping you could also elaborate a bit more into the assumption of price moderation in 2024, given they do have the refreshed SUVs you talked about, as well as with the strength in your pickup truck business currently kind of exiting this year. So maybe a little bit more clarification on kind of what you're assuming there.

Yes. Itay, first, on the pricing environment right now. As we've seen, we've got a great portfolio that customers are very motivated by. We've seen that demand continue to hold up even as maybe some of the macro has been a little bit choppy, and we've been very deliberate in our incentive strategy going forward. As we look to 2024, I would say that the -- we want to make sure that we're aware and monitoring the macro out there. So I think we'll continue to look for strength, but we've got to make sure that we're prepared if we don't see that going forward. And that's been the balance between capital and cash flow generation that we have, I think, done pretty successfully over the last couple of years, going forward. And then I'm sorry, the first part of your question, you talked about the offsets? I apologize.

Yes. Just want to -- curious if we're kind of sticking with the 8% to 10% GMNA margin target for the next 2 years.

Absolutely. That's still very much intact, and we're going to hold to that.

Our next question comes from Ryan Brinkman with JPMorgan.

It's clearly impressive you're targeting cost savings in excess of the labor cost increase. But I assume that comment is from an earnings perspective. Can you maybe help us think about the cash impacts of these cost increases and expense savings? And how would you rate the visibility into the cost and cash savings? It seems like a lot of them stem from simply lower than earlier expected outlays for advertising and CapEx, et cetera, without maybe a lot of execution risk. For example, with regard to needed restructuring actions, et cetera. But I wanted to get your thoughts.

Well, I think -- Ryan, thanks for the question. The cost program has really been aimed at current spend rates and where we've been. So we've seen a lot of escalation in, for example, headcount and marketing spend, among other administrative pieces. The voluntary program was successful. We've got to maintain that headcount discipline going forward to make sure that we realize those savings after doing that reset. And there's a lot of work that the HR team is doing around organizational design, and I feel confident that we're going to be able to hold on to those savings. That's an absolute reduction from where we were on the run rates. Same is true for marketing spend. Norm de Greve has come in, and he's done a really good job of working with the team to drive efficiency. We've already driven about $800 million of marketing spend out of the organization, while we've continued to build share and maintain strong pricing. So in going forward, I would say that there's a mix of largely cash-, some noncash-type or cash deferred-type savings going forward. But we do expect that this will continue to flow to the bottom line. We're looking at engineering, we're looking at design, we're looking across the organization administratively to make sure that we continue to drive those savings and that efficiency.

Our next question comes from John Murphy with Bank of America.

Just a question on the labor cost inflation. I mean, obviously, you're disclosing what you expect relative to the contract that you reached with the UAW. But just curious what you think about the rest of the labor cost stack. I mean the UAW, as far as I understand, is about 1/3 of your labor cost and there's about 2/3 outside of the union. So do you expect there to be significant inflation there? Or has that already occurred in past years? And also, Mary, you alluded to the competition raising rates in a similar fashion sort of near term for the folks that are incumbents. But there are EV entrants, Tesla and the inevitability of Chinese being in the U.S. market at some point maybe in the not-too-distant future. Have you thought about sort of benchmarking your labor costs relative to what that eventuality will be?

John, it's a great question. And yes, the answer is absolutely yes. And we recognize we have to compete with those companies that don't have union representation. And we have to hold ourself accountable to drive that efficiency across the board, and we will. So there's a lot of initiatives underway. When you look at -- in the past, we've had a gap between nonrepresented and represented from a workforce perspective, and we were able to still compete and have, in many cases, superior margins. I think that speaks to how we drive efficiency. And I would say we've really not doubled down on it, but tripled down on how we drive efficiency across that. Frankly, our Winning with Simplicity and the work we're doing to drive those product improvements, I think, are going to really lead the way from that space. But bottom line is we absolutely have to be competitive with those that aren't represented by unions and some of the new entrants. So we will not stop until we're there. And as it relates to our salaried workforce. As we look -- as we've all talked about and we've talked about on these calls before, how you win is having the very best talent. And so we've remained with very strong compensation across the board with our talent that's not represented. And as we move forward, we'll continue to make sure we benchmark and we're competitive and have the right offerings to attract the very, very best employees to get the work done.

And I think, John, just one other point to add to what Mary said. And I think the environment that we need to continue to watch and make sure that we're driving as much productivity as we can, is we need to be conscious of what supplier labor costs are going to do in particular. So while some are UAW, some are not, I think obviously, the labor environment over the last few years is continuing to drive higher costs. We're working with our supply chain to try to offset that with as much productivity as we can. But it is something that we're watching over the next couple of years as well.

And just one follow-up on Cruise. I mean, Mary, some of the disclosure and the way some of the news rolled out on Cruise came out in a very un-GM-like. I mean, you guys are very systematic and forthcoming in disclosure. And some of the ways that the interventions being greater than people had thought in the past. And just the way that news rolled out was very uncharacteristic for GM, particularly as of late. As far as that reporting structure up to you and how that will be worked out in the future, I mean, that's not really the auspices of this study, it's more of a management issue that seemed to occur at Cruise. Can you kind of explain sort of what happened there and if you view that as cured with some of the management changes that have been made there? Or is that something that's still forthcoming in the review?

Well, I think I'm going to -- we'll learn more in the review. But I think when you look at the very strong structure we have with two co-presidents, one with Craig Glidden, who is very aligned to the regulatory, he's been very aligned from a strategy as a member of the Cruise Board since we put the Board in place. I think he's very strong in what he's driving. And then taking the senior tech person from Cruise, Mo Elshenawy, and elevating his role. He's been with the company for more than 6 years, is very talented. The engineering team, he has high respect for. And by the way, it's a very talented team there. I think we're coming together and we're finding more in common. So I have a lot of confidence with what the two co-Presidents will do. And GM will be leaning in to make sure that it meets our strict requirements from a safety perspective. And as we move forward, I'll share more about it. But I agree with you. It was uncharacteristic and it definitely is something that we're working to manage well, but more to follow on that.

Our next question comes from Emmanuel Rosner with Deutsche Bank.

First question, just a technical one. Can you just maybe go over how the ASR is working in practice? Obviously, retiring $6.8 billion of stock immediately, I assume that the banks are providing you a commitment or guarantee on a specific stock price. So maybe either what is that price or how many shares are being retired immediately? And I understand, obviously, the rest of it will depend on future stock price.

Yes. So thanks, Emmanuel. What I would say is the $6.8 billion is being delivered by the banks immediately to us, and that will be done today. That will result in roughly about a $0.05 to $0.10 per share EPS benefit in 2023. It's not bigger because we're so late in the year and it's a weighted average, but it will be significant in 2024 as we go into that. And then the share -- the rest of the shares and all the shares will be repurchased really probably over the next, I would say, 11 months or so, just really driven by average daily trading volume. So we're still beholden to the rules of the exchanges and the SEC in terms of share buybacks. But we have absolutely committed contractually to the $10 billion and sent that money over to the banks, consistent with the way ASRs work.

But can you say, sorry, how many shares are being retired as part of the $6.8 billion?

No, it's based on a calculation that still has some uncertainty into it right now. But just assume the $6.8 billion, assume the $0.05 to $0.10 per share benefit this year. And we'll have more details as we talk about 2024 guidance.

Understood. Second question is a clarification on the cost savings. So I think you're indicating the -- you're targeting to offset these higher labor costs, which I expected to be $1.5 billion. Obviously, as part of like the $2 billion plan that you had already highlighted, there was going to be about $1 billion incremental, 2024 versus 2023. So are you essentially saying there will be more actions taking it above the $2 billion? Or that -- or I guess, how does the full offset happen?

Yes. So the extra $1 billion, Emmanuel, was really to offset depreciation and amortization in 2024 that we were seeing to get us to that net $2 billion. And as I said earlier, I think it was in response to Rod's question, we'll publish the reconciliation of how we're looking at it.

I guess for the labor cost offset, what sort of -- are you essentially planning additional cost savings?

So labor cost offsets, think about it in the context of making sure that we get to the EBIT levels and similar EBIT trajectory that we've been on going forward. So we'd already built in some of that inflation into our expectations for 2024, per Mary's comments. These came out slightly above where we were going to do, but that's all been factored into our forward projections.

Our next question comes from Adam Jonas with Morgan Stanley.

So Mary or Paul, in your opinion, what is the biggest reason why GM's earnings are valued at a lower multiple than almost any other company in the world, in any industry?

Well, Adam, I appreciate the question, and it's something that we're not satisfied with. I think when you look at, there's been a lot of uncertainty in our industry. And frankly, we didn't execute well this year as it relates to demonstrating our EV capability and the capability of Ultium, because of the module manufacturing automation equipment issues that we had. So I'm disappointed in that. I think that has created some concern. I am very confident with the EV portfolio that we have and the work that we've done to deliver significantly more Ultium-based products that customers, I think, will really appreciate because they're going to meet, they're going to check all the boxes that a consumer looks at. That will be something we need as a proof point tomorrow -- or proof point next year, excuse me. I wish it was tomorrow. So that's going to be important. Paul will talk about it a bit more tomorrow, hopefully, to give our investors confidence there. I think the other is some of the uncertainty around Cruise. You and I have talked about that in the past. And we do think this is important technology, but we think -- and I really respect the work of the team. It's a very talented team, the technical team at Cruise. And I think as we go forward, we're -- and again, based on the results of the independent and safety reviews, we will be very transparent with what our go-forward plan is. But I think there's been some concern about when that comes. I think what's important to note, that I can tell you even now before we talk about the exact plans for Cruise going forward, is that we had already been working and found significant synergies between the work we do, especially from the technical team on the software, that I think is going to drive more efficiencies. But I think those are the main two reasons, Adam, and we need to demonstrate and execute on EVs. And when I think we have a very clear path forward with autonomous, I think that will really be 2 of the issues. I don't know, Paul, if you have anything to add.

Yes. I would just add, Adam, that I think it -- certainly, there's been some self-inflicted harm in that in terms of some of our execution. I think we've got our arms around that as we're scaling up. I think there's a little bit of sort of legacy viewpoint of the cyclical nature of the industry and the company as a whole. And any time you try to break out of some of those cyclical patterns, there's a natural instinct, I think, for the market to default back to them. So as we've struggled to maybe get some of the EVs out at the volumes that we wanted to this year, as we're working on it, as we've seen capital costs increase, et cetera, I think there's a natural inclination to believe that the current level of spend, investment in the company and ultimately the current level of free cash flow generation is unsustainable. I'm a bit of a fundamental guy. I think part of today's announcement is to make sure that, as the market sees free cash flow generation, it can expect to have that return to shareholders because we've taken a very balanced approach: We've invested in our people, we're investing in our company, we're investing in the future, and we're returning capital to shareholders, all against the backdrop of a healthy balance sheet. So we expect to continue to drive the business for better free cash flow performance, as you'll hear tomorrow. We do expect better execution around EVs. And I think as we look at where EVs sit today from a profitability standpoint, we haven't shied away from the fact that they're not making money, but we'll show how volume, and we'll show some of the other initiatives that we're doing, how that accelerates up the profitability curve to get to variable profit and ultimately EBIT profitability according to the targets that we've laid out in 2025. So I hope that this is coming together. I think we own it. You've heard very clearly from Mary and the Board that we're not happy with where the stock sits right now. And you've got a management team and a Board that's absolutely committed to turning it around.

Mary, when you became CEO in January of 2014, GM was facing a real crisis with the ignition switch recall, and you used that crisis to make really important changes to GM's operation and its culture, seems like yesterday. And it was a lightning rod for positive change. 10 years later, you have, I think many people on this call and I think your team would agree, there's another crisis on your hands with Cruise. Can the situation at Cruise, as serious as it is, and we know you're still gathering your facts, can that be a rallying call for you and your team to address other problems at the company that need immediate attention? Or do you see the crisis isolated more to Cruise?

Yes. Adam, again, I appreciate the question. I think definitely the answer is yes to both. And frankly, we've already started that. When you look at the fact that we haven't executed the way we had planned to this year, have already engaged the entire top leadership team a couple of weeks ago, making it very clear what expectations are for performance and accountability. I think you've also seen a lot of leadership changes this year to make sure. So that lightning rod effect, that we're going to have the right team and execute the strategy, is already underway. We will use it as a lightning rod to take the next step in our culture to drive performance and accountability. And as it relates to Cruise, yes. I mean, I understand there's the concern about the capital being deployed. I think this is important technology for the future from a societal and safety perspective. It's got to be done right. And again, I've asked for the opportunity to wait till I have both independent reviews. But I think you will see us coming forward with a very streamlined plan that allows us to leverage the talent and the work that's been done in an appropriate way that's really going to add growth to the business overall. So the lightning rod effect, you know I've never shied away from that. And the cultural change is already underway within the company from a GM proper perspective. But with Cruise, the amount of opportunity that we have in front of us to execute there is significant.

Our next question comes from Tom Narayan with RBC.

Yes, just on the ASR, and I understand after Adam's question that probably the big rationale behind it is the stock price and where it is. Just curious how you arrived at those numbers, the 6.8 and then the $10 billion in aggregate. Are these potentially part of future liquidity goals? And what all other things does that already incorporate in terms of your plan strategically?

So Tom, thanks for the question. What I would say is the $10 billion was really governed by what we would view as surplus cash that we've accumulated. If you look at the earnings trajectory and the cash flow generation of the company, we've been steadily building cash. We obviously needed to make sure that we had ample piles of liquidity available to us to work through the uncertainty of the labor stoppage, et cetera, as we went through that. So we've been, I think, deliberately kind of building cash up. Now that we have certainty to the deal, the $10 billion was what we determined was something we could do comfortably. I would say it stretched us a little bit, but we could do it comfortably and still maintain the liquidity and targets that are important to maintain the credit ratings that we have. Because as we've said before, we've got to maintain a strong balance sheet going forward. So I think it was a really good mark. On the $6.8 billion retired immediately, I'll just say that, that's part of the ASR structure. There's a lot of different flexibilities and levers, and I don't want to go into the decisions that were made there, but that's a sizable position upfront.

Okay. And then a quick follow-up. Obviously, the whole EV slowdown topic is on everybody's minds. And one of the things that comes from surveys is affordability in pricing, is the rationale behind why that's happening. Just noticing your guys -- maybe to put it, the lower-end EV models, [ meaning ] the Blazers and Equinoxes. If you look at the pricing, they seem to be priced well above their ICE cohorts. Just curious as to how comfortable you are with the pricing of your EVs, given that so much of the emphasis and the rationale behind this EV slowdown is pricing. And how confident you are in how you price those. And how much cushion do you have to potentially lowering that pricing, if needed.

Well, I think we've always looked at what the right pricing level is for our EVs versus our ICE vehicles. But I think when you look at -- remember, when a first model comes out, it's different than what the portfolio in that model of pricing based on what trim levels and option packages are in. But I think you're right in that you have to have affordable EVs to drive significant EV adoption, when you just look at where the market is and where the biggest segments are in affordability overall. I think when you look at where the variants of Blazers and Equinox will come out, as well as in '25 when we launch the Ultium-based Volt, I think you're going to see General Motors having the right pricing ladder of EVs available. And what will come along with that, Tom, though, is also a more robust charging infrastructure. I do -- you can talk about affordability, but when we look at what the consumer is telling us, there is still a concern is the charging infrastructure robust. And there's many different initiatives going on from a government, from a private, from a coalition of collaboration to get a robust charging network. I think all of those are going to drive, and we're going to be ready with the right-price vehicles and still be able to hit our EV margin goals. So I'm very much looking forward to, as we get these vehicles out and provide that affordable EV, that matches up with the charging network and still is done leveraging our technology and our scale to drive profitability as well.

Great. Yes. And you're totally right, charging infrastructure seems to be more psychological than real, at least in our view.

Our next question comes from Mark Delaney with Goldman Sachs.

The company said it expects improved EV margins in 2024 as it progresses with Ultium. Are you also expecting a lower EBIT loss next year from EVs? Or would selling more EV units mean that EVs are a dollar headwind year-on-year to profitability? And any color you can share on the magnitude of that headwind or tailwind?

Yes, Mark, what I would ask is -- we'll share more of those details tomorrow. But commensurate with the curve that we're on as we ramp up volume, we're absorbing a lot of fixed costs that are already into the system in terms of depreciation and infrastructure investments. So we actually believe that the EV losses would be lower next year, year-over-year.

That's helpful, Paul. And is there -- already a lot of discussion around labor and how that will trend in '24 and beyond. But maybe if you can talk about some of the other inputs, at least at this stage, in '24 versus '23. And as you think about raw materials, commodities and logistics, some of those other costs, how should we think of those in '24 versus this year?

Yes. We'll obviously provide more of that as we get closer to the end of the year. We're finalizing our budgets right now, need to take it to the Board. But ultimately, as you look, a lot of the battery raw materials have come down significantly in price, particularly when you look at lithium. So that's going to provide a really good tailwind for us, and we'll incorporate more of that into the commentary tomorrow at the conference. But others, like steel, et cetera, we've seen a little bit of an increase. So I think it's a little bit too soon to tell. But overall, I would say that there's probably a slight tailwind in the overall commodity package.

Our last question comes from the line of Colin Langan with Wells Fargo.

Just looking at the slides, you estimate $2.5 billion in UAW costs or UAW and Unifor costs in 2027. It's actually quite a bit higher than I was expecting, because we actually have UAW highlighters. I think their highlighter said that wages are up at the production level $11 an hour. You add a little bit more for 401(k) and pension increases, I'm still coming short of even $2 billion. Outside the pension, 401(k) and actual dollar wages, what other numbers are in that $2.5 billion that's making it so high? I mean, is there headcount? Is it the battery plants being added?

Yes, Colin, thanks for the question. What I would say is between the UAW disclosures and what we're talking about, we're talking about it at a company level, which is going to incorporate volume, it's going to incorporate different assumptions on COLA, things like that, going forward. So largely I would say headcount and some of the other assumptions that are embedded in there. But we'll continue to refine that as we get closer. But this is our best view today.

Got it. And then the free cash flow outlook rather substantially increases. Is that sustainable? Or is there any sort of working capital help? And why the sudden sort of improvement with only 1 quarter left?

I'm sorry, you're talking about free cash flow long term?

The guidance for this year is up substantially from where it was pre-strike.

Yes, you were talking about for '23. So we had seen and had talked about our cumulative cash flow through Q3, and slightly positive in Q4 even in spite of the strike going forward. So we've driven efficiencies in capital spending. And as Mary said in her remarks, we're taking down gradually the medium-term CapEx as we continue to refine the portfolio through moves like eliminating a future vehicle program and instead spending significantly less capital to bring the Volt, the next-generation Volt, which is a vehicle that's really well received by customers, into a lower-cost Ultium platform going forward. And that's going to save us significant capital down the line. We estimate about $5 [ million ] in future CapEx that we save by doing that. And we're continuing to look at the portfolio and make sure we're investing smartly. And as the teams that are deployed on Winning with Simplicity and some of the other initiatives that we've talked about, we continue to expect to try to manage those capital levels down, in an effort to continue to drive free cash flow.

But there's nothing onetime in that $11 billion-ish rate for this year as we're thinking about next year?

No.

Thank you. At this time, there are no further questions. I would like to turn the call back over to Mary.

Thank you very much. And first of all, thanks, everybody, for your questions. Thanks for participating. I'd like just to end by summarizing related to GM's strategy. There's been a lot of questions, and I want to make sure everybody understands, our strategy hasn't changed. It's based on 4 pillars. Our strong ICE business that, frankly, has gotten stronger, and we still believe there's growth there when you look at the strength of our product portfolio. EVs that we've been disappointed with this year, but next year is going to be an important year. And we think by midyear or sooner, we'll have the module constraints completely behind us. And then we have, I think, a very balanced and customer-focused portfolio of EVs that we'll be rolling out that meet their needs and will help drive adoptions. The software that will be on top of it, very important. And with Mike Abbott and his team, along with what we've been doing from a built into the vehicle, from a software-defined vehicle perspective, I think we're going to shed a lot of light on that, and that's a very important part of our business. And then from an autonomy perspective, on autonomous vehicles. And as I've said, we will be guided by what we learn in the 2 independent reviews. But this technology is significant, and we have a very talented team at Cruise that has done incredible work. So our strategy hasn't changed. What has changed is our tactics, and our tactics are changing to align with what's happening in the marketplace. As you look at a transformation as significant from an EV and an autonomy perspective, they are not -- generally, that type of significant technology transformation is not linear. So we're going to be responsive to what's happening in the market and what we learn from a technology perspective, to continue to have a very strong business that has strong growth, has strong cash flow and has strong EBIT performance. And that's what this management team is focused on, and that's what we are committing to continue to deliver to you day in and day out as we face the challenges of this really once in a generation type transformation. So again, I appreciate your time. You'll hear more from Paul tomorrow at the conference, and then I look forward to talking to you as we get into Q4 earnings and into our Investor Day next year. So thanks very much, everyone.

That concludes the conference call for today. Thank you for joining.