Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, April 4, 1990 TAG: 9004040703
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: C6 EDITION: EVENING
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: NEW YORK LENGTH: Medium
With nearly $127 billion in sales and $4.2 billion in earnings in 1989, GM garnered first place on the Fortune 500 and Forbes "Super 50" lists, released Tuesday.
The Fortune 500, as familiar on Main Street as on Wall Street, ranks the nation's largest industrial companies by sales. Forbes ranks all public companies by sales, profits, assets and stock market value.
Both magazines have issued 500 rankings for years, but Tuesday was the first time in recent years that the lists were released the same day. In an effort to upstage its competitor, Forbes topped its rankings with a so-called Super 50, which it described as the most powerful companies across all four categories.
The Fortune 500 had a profit decline in 1989 after years of strong growth, reflecting the slowdown in industrial America.
Behind GM, Fortune's top 10 were: Ford Motor Co., Exxon Corp., International Business Machines Corp., General Electric Co., Mobil Corp., Philip Morris Cos., Chrysler Corp., Du Pont Co. and Texaco Inc.
The top 10 of the Forbes Super 50 were: GE, Exxon, IBM, Ford, Philip Morris, American Telephone & Telegraph Corp., Mobil, Du Pont and Sears, Roebuck and Co.
The Fortune 500 list appears in the April 23 edition, available on newsstands today. Forbes released its list two weeks before it is to hit the stands in the April 30 edition.
"It's a horse race every year," said Forbes spokesman Ray Healey, describing his magazine's rush to beat its rival. "Information of this kind is old in a matter of minutes. As soon as we have it locked in solid, we send it out."
Marshall Loeb, Fortune managing editor, dismissed the competition.
"Fortune has been at the 500 for years and years. It's part of the language. I've never heard anyone in conversation say, `We're part of the Forbes 500.' "
Despite topping Forbes' earnings list, GM reported that profits fell 13 percent last year. Ford's profits fell 28 percent in 1989 to $3.84 billion, Forbes said. Earnings were down 66 percent to $359 million at Chrysler.
Foreign competition, especially from the Japanese, was particularly acute in the motor vehicles and parts industry, which ranked as the poorest performer by nearly every measure of profitability, according to Fortune. That sector also was hurt by high interest rates and rebates.
Fortune 500 sales jumped 7 percent to a record $2.16 trillion in 1989, but overall earnings fell 8.2 percent to $105.6 billion. In the previous two years, profits among the big manufacturers climbed an unprecedented 79 percent.
Only 264 of the Fortune 500 had earnings growth, down from 327 in 1988.
The motor vehicles and parts industry suffered the largest median earnings decline, down 25 percent, followed by aerospace, down 12.5 percent, and petroleum refining, down 11.8 percent.
by CNB