A quarterly report to Congress on Tuesday showed, to-date, the U.S. government has lost $9.7 billion on the almost $50 billion bailout of General Motors. In 2009, the U.S. Treasury offered the company a lifeline extended in $9.5 billion in loans to GM in exchange for a 60% stake and more than $2 billion in preferred stock.
The Treasury has reduced the government’s stake in the company through the sale of its stock, Reuters reports, but all of those sales were at prices below what was needed to recoup the investment in GM. The U.S. currently holds a 7.3% stake in GM, according to USA Today, which “equates to about 101 million shares of GM common stock, and to break even it now would have to sell those shares for an average of about $150. GM closed Monday at $35.80 making the remaining taxpayer stake worth about $3.6 billion.” The government has indicated it plans to sell its remaining shares in the next six months.
The congressional report was submitted by the Special Inspector General, who oversees the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program.
