General Electric cuts dividend to 1c on the back of $22bn writedown
New York — General Electric (GE) slashed its quarterly dividend to 1c a share, promised to restructure its power unit and said it faced a deeper accounting probe as new CEO Larry Culp took his first steps to revive the struggling conglomerate. GE said the US Securities and Exchange Commission and Department of Justice had expanded ongoing investigations to include a $22bn writedown of goodwill from GE’s power division, which GE reported on Tuesday. GE’s restructuring of Power comes as the 126-year-old company, once the most valuable US corporation, is reeling from missteps that have eroded profits and forced it to announce more than $40 billion in writedowns in less than a year, among the largest such actions in US corporate history. Culp, who took over on October 1, delivered more bad news on Tuesday: GE will significantly miss its full-year cash flow target of about $6bn, and cannot estimate profits for the year until Culp gets more detail about its ailing power unit. GE all but e...
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