PROFITS IN AUTOMOBILES

Sun (Auckland), Volume II, Issue 468, 25 September 1928, Page 14

PROFITS IN AUTOMOBILES

GENERAL MOTORS’ HUGE / INCOME For the first six months of this year the net earnings of the General Motors Corporation amounted to £32,253,600. This total of profits is asserted to be the largest ever announced by any American company for any half-year. During the corresponding term in 1927 net earnings were appproximately £25,800.000, and the increase for the term is 24.8 per cent. Including undivided profits brought, forward, the sum available for the common stock of the company, after providing for the preferred and debenture stock dividends, -was nearly £1 17s 6d a share. The company has steadily increased the business done by it during the whole of this year. It is officially announced that for the six months ended June 30 retail sales amounted to 1,062,733 cars, compared with 840,481* cars in the like period of 1927. Sales to dealers are reported to have been 1,083,316 cars, as compared with 883,447 cars for the six months ended June 30, 1927. Apart from the extent of its own trade transactions the directors of the company have engaged in insurance on a vast scale. For instance, in order to promote what is described as ’'effectiveness of employer-employee relationships,” the company has just entered into an exceedingly large life insurance contract. This is to provide nearly £80,000,000 of group life insurance, also a very large total of group sickness and accident insurance for the 200,000 of its own employees and those of its subsidiaries and affiliated companies. This insurance business has been placed with the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company, and it is understood that the terms include no provision for the medical examination of the employees. RAILWAY WORKSHOPS BIG CONTRACT LET A contract has recently been placed with A. and T. Burt, Ltd., for the complete installation of Plenum heating and ventilating plants in the railway workshops at Hutt Valley, Otahuhu, Hillside and Addington. The contractors will be responsible for the design and complete installation of this work, and it is gratifying to know that more than half of the apparatus will be constructed in the firm’s various works in the Dominion. It is now a recognised fact that an efficient heating and ventilating plant is a necessary adjunct to the complete equipment of a modern workshop. It has been proved in practice that the installation of such plants becomes a valuable asset, as the output in the factory is considerably increased when proper working conditions are maintained.

MINING NEWS LUCKY SHOT.—The manager reports: "The drive south on the main reef from the bottom of No. 2 winze has been extended out to 32ft. from the winze. The reef is wider than the drive with no walls exposed. No gold has been visible during the week, but the ore Is interspersed by heavily mineralised veins of a verly favourable description.”