General Electric’s shares tumbled by ~10% on Monday and got as low as $7.72, after the CEO of the company in an interview with CNBC said GE may fall short of its 2018 sales target.
As part of the interview given to CNBC, Larry Culp said the first priority for the company is to bring its leverage down through assets sales. GE’s debt-to-equity ratio for the third quarter stood at 3.7%, which is more than four times the industry average of 0.77%.
The ailing condition of a number of GE's business segment, like power, aren't helping much in the process. Hit badly by the prolonged downturn in the power industry, a slew of other problems like goodwill write-down and increasing liquidity crunch is making things all the more difficult for the company and its CEO to stage a comeback.
Earlier this year, the company warned that it might miss its previous guidance for the full-year earnings and free cash flow, but didn't provide any new guidance after reporting disappointing Q3 results last month.