General Electric Posts Impressive Quarter And Outlook

JP Morgan has published a research report on General Electric Company GE after the company reported 4Q earnings that came in above estimates and elude to improving trends. In the report, JP Morgan writes "4Q EPS of $0.36 was a clean beat to Street/JPM $0.32. Segment profits were $0.03 ahead of our estimate, with a penny and a half each from Tech Infrastructure and GE Capital. Below the line, corporate was $0.08 worse than our estimate (restructuring + environmental charges) offset by a $0.08 tailwind from tax. These offset, and reflect GE's intraquarter guidance on environmental/tax that was not in our standing model but communicated publicly by the company. On Capital, provisions of $1.35B were below our $1.61B, while pre-tax earnings were $927mm (JPMe $786mm) and PTPP was $2.28B (3Q $2.16B, JPME: $2.39B). GECS equity came in at $69B (3Q $66.9B)." JP Morgan maintains its Overweight rating on General Electric, which closed yesterday at $18.43.