General Motors' profits back up and running

Chris Liddell, GM's chief financial officer, said the first-quarter results showed that the top US automaker was making progress and had a "good chance" of turning a full-year profit.

But he declined to offer any forecast for the remainder of the year and said that while an initial public offering was possible over the

next year, the timing remained uncertain.

"Now that we have achieved profitability, the next step is to achieve sustainable profitability," Liddell told reporters at GM's Detroit headquarters.

GM received $50bn (34.5bn) of US government financing for its restructuring in bankruptcy and has been aiming to launch an initial public offering that would allow the US government to reduce its majority stake in the automaker later this year.

Revenue rose to $31.48bn, from $22.43bn in the pre-bankruptcy GM a year before.

Net income – after preferred stock dividends to the US and Canadian governments and GM's major union – was $865m, compared with a loss of $5.98bn a year before.

Under the terms of GM's restructuring, almost 61 per cent of the automaker is owned by the US government. Canada and the province of Ontario own nearly 12 per cent.

GM posted a $4.3bn loss in 2009 for the period between July, when it emerged from a bankruptcy steered by the Obama administration, until the end of the year.