UAW Widens Strike in Wake of GM Withdrawing 2023 Guidance, Union Still Has Capacity to Expand Actions

General Motors’ Q3 earnings report, which included a suspension of its profit outlook, was followed by an expansion of strikes at several of the company’s facilities. 45,800 UAW workers are now on strike across 46 facilities owned by Detroit’s Big Three automakers. Though nearly a third of the union workforce at these companies is now on the picket line, which might cost the UAW close to $23 million per week in strike pay, a glut of cash held by the union means it has the ability to maintain this strike – and expand it – for many weeks to come.

Work stoppages have already impacted GM’s expected earnings for Q4, potentially cutting -$600 million from its measurement of EBIT. An additional -$200 million per week could be ripped from company profitability for as long as the strike continues. Ford is set to report earnings on Thursday, which could herald a repeat of the events that played out on Tuesday. However, UAW President Shawn Fain has suggested in recent statements that an aggressive scaling up of strike actions by the union may signal the union’s last step before new deals with automakers are struck.

Related Stocks: Ford Motor Company (F), General Motors Company (GM), Stellantis N.V. (STLA)

General Motors (GM) reported Q3 earnings yesterday, which were broadly positive. Revenues rose by 5.4% and adjusted earnings per share came in at $2.28, ahead of Wall Street expectations and up from $2.25 a year ago. Though GM did feel some pain from the United Auto Worker (UAW) strikes, losses derived from the work stoppages were equivalent to just $200 million in Q3. This is a relatively small figure when compared to nearly $3.6 billion in earnings before interest and taxes (EBIT) generated the quarter, but that is due to the fact that the UAW’s strike did not kick off until mid-September – covering just the final two weeks of the quarter. This was also the earliest part of the strike, when actions against Detroit’s Big Three automakers (GM, Ford, and Chrysler owner Stellantis) were at their most mild pace. By the end of September, 25,300, roughly 17% of the automakers’ UAW workforce had joined the picket line.

Throughout October, the number of strikers among the Big Three has now swelled to 45,800, or around 31% of their union employees, when including the 5,000 GM workers that walked off of the job at the company’s lucrative Arlington, TX assembly plant after earnings were announced yesterday. The UAW likely sought to rain on any optimism GM and its shareholders might have generated in their better-than-expected earnings report, giving the automaker no relief as the union continues to bargain for large pay increases and dominion over the automakers’ new battery plants, which will be instrumental in the future of American EV manufacturing. “Another record quarter, another record year. As we’ve said for months: record profits equal record contracts,” said UAW President Shawn Fain in a statement. A total of 46 Big Three facilities (eight assembly plants and 38 parts distribution centers) have been targeted by strikes thus far.

In light of the UAW’s willingness to be aggressive and unpredictable in their strike action, GM has…