Good morning. Earnings season is taking some twists and turns.
General Motors’ Q1 earnings call was scheduled to take place on Tuesday, but the auto giant announced it would be postponed until Thursday, “based on recent reports regarding updates to trade policy.” The White House announced Tuesday afternoon an executive order that provides some tweaks on the 25% tariffs on imported vehicles and auto parts. For example, automakers that pay tariffs on imported cars won’t be forced to pay other duties implemented, like steel and aluminum. This year, automakers that manufacture vehicles in the U.S. will get a 15% rebate to offset the cost of the tariffs. That rebate would be 10% the second year.
The tariff updates “sound good on paper,” but a U.S.-made car with entirely U.S.-sourced parts is “a fictional tale not possible today,” Wedbush Securities analysts Dan Ives and Sam Brandeis wrote in a Wednesday morning note. The analysts estimate it could take four to five years to establish U.S.-based factories or production hubs. The average auto sticker price will “go up roughly $5,000 to $10,000 when this tariff situation is all settled” and inventory cycles through current stock, Wedbush predicted.
GM (No. 19 on the Fortune 500) did release its Q1 results on Tuesday. For the quarter, the adjusted diluted EPS was $2.78, up 6.1% year over year and ahead of the $2.74 LSEG consensus. Revenue was $44.02 billion, compared to estimates of $43.05 billion. And the company withdrew its 2025 guidance.
It’s unclear whether no 2025 guidance will be issued or if GM will instead lower the guidance it gave on Jan. 28, according to Morningstar equity strategist David Whiston. “We view the guidance withdrawal as purely from massive tariff uncertainty overhang rather than company-specific problems,” Whiston wrote in a note on Tuesday. “We don’t think any executive on our U.S. autos coverage has sufficient clarity to make capital allocation decisions for the mid-to-long term, let alone a 2025 profit forecast.”
Tuesday’s adjustment to the auto tariff policy should bring some clarity as it limits the tariff exposure primarily to the 25% foreign autos tariff, he said. “But there’s always the risk of more tariff policy amendments,” according to Whiston.
GM is not alone in withdrawing its guidance. For example, earlier this month, CarMax, the largest retailer of used cars in the U.S., backed away from offering a long-term financial goals timeline due to tariff uncertainty. “Why put a target out there that’s really speculative, not knowing exactly where this environment is going to go?” CarMax CEO Bill Nash said April 10 on an earnings call.
This earnings season, many companies are foregoing the tradition of predicting quarterly profits. However, there are exceptions, like Levi’s, whose CFO Harmit Singh recently told me that the company would maintain 2025 top- and bottom-line guidance.
I’m sure analysts will have plenty of questions for GM during its earnings call on Thursday.
Sheryl Estrada
sheryl.estrada@fortune.com
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From CFO to Chief Value Officer: A Strategic Evolution |
Unlock the potential of CFOs as chief value officers, balancing traditional roles with strategic foresight to drive value creation. |
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Jay Shah was appointed CFO of Synapse Health, a medical equipment provider. Shah has more than 20 years of experience. Most recently, he served as CFO at Integra Partners. Before that, Shah held several leadership roles at American Express Company, including VP and CFO of global commercial payments. He also served as served as VP and CFO at Global Prepaid Group and Global Real Estate Group.
Kevin Wolf was appointed CFO of Crossover Markets, a digital asset trading technology firm. Wolf, a Crossover board member since June 2024, most recently served as CFO at the American Financial Exchange, where he played a key role in its January 2025 acquisition by Intercontinental Exchange. Before that, Wolf was a board member and later CEO at Euronext FX, previously known as FastMatch.
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ISACA’s global Quantum Computing Pulse Poll finds that 62% of technology and cybersecurity professionals are worried that quantum computing will break today’s internet encryption. Yet only 5% say it’s a high priority for the near future, and just 5% say their companies have a defined quantum computing strategy.
“Quantum computing has revolutionary potential; however, there are also clear concerns about the risks it presents,” according to ISACA, an international professional association focused on IT governance. More than 2,600 global professionals in digital trust, cybersecurity, IT audit, governance, and risk were surveyed in this poll.
Almost half (48%) are very or somewhat optimistic about quantum computing’s impact in their sector or industry. Sixty-three percent believe it will speed up computational tasks or data analysis, and 46% say it will create revolutionary innovations.
However, it will require significant preparation. Sixty-three percent say quantum will increase or shift cybersecurity risks, and more than half (57%) say it will create new business risks.
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“Amazon pours cold water on report saying it will show how tariffs affect each product’s price: ‘Never a consideration for the main Amazon site’” is a new Fortune report by Dave Smith and Jason Del Rey.
From the report: “The White House is coming down on Amazon over a Tuesday report from Punchbowl News that claimed the world’s largest online retailer will start showing how much Trump’s tariffs affect the price of each product. Amazon, however, says the report was inaccurate and ‘never a consideration for the main Amazon site.’”
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“I was a master, and I loved it because I had the headphones. In the drive-thru, you get to order everybody around, so that was definitely about my speed.”
—Build-a-Bear Workshop chief executive Sharon Price John told Fortune in an interview about her first job as a teenager working at a McDonald’s drive-thru.
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