General Motors (NYSE: GM) will pay a quarterly dividend of $0.59375 per share on its Series B mandatory convertible junior preferred stock on 2 December 2013 to Series B holders of record as of 15 November. The total amount of the dividend is approximately $59.4 million. GM does not pay a dividend on its common stock.
The announcement comes as the U.S. Department of the Treasury is continuing its sales of GM stock by starting a third “pre-defined written trading plan” at the end of September. Terms were not disclosed. At the conclusion of the second trading plan, taxpayers held 101.3 million shares of GM stock, or about 7%, which together with the sales from the first plan means that the U.S. government has now sold about 200 million shares of GM common.
Treasury did not specify how many of the remaining shares would be sold, but if market demand is large enough, the slur “Government Motors” may fade into the pages of the history of the failed Bush Administration before the end of the year.
At current stock market prices, U.S. taxpayers will likely lose ~$10 billion on the GM bailout. In December 2012, GM repurchased 200 million shares of GM common stock from Treasury. At that time, Treasury said that it would sell its remaining 300 million shares into the market in an “orderly fashion” and fully exit its GM investment within the next 12-15 months. Treasury appears to be well ahead of that schedule.
