CNBC Opening Bell and Opening Comments -- Nothing About the Bakken

Updates

April 28, 2011: GE sees best profit outlook in a decade. Skip the article. Read the comments.


April 21, 2011: GE's profit jumps 77 percent and pays no income taxes; increases dividend for third time in one year. For those who might have forgotten, the GE/CEO is the administration's economic czar. I can see why -- making that much money and not paying federal income taxes.

March 31, 2011: When I first posted the GE story, it was mostly a throw-away post. I thought it interesting but not much more than that. Little did I think it was going to become a big, big story. Today it's the front page story on CNN.com. 

March 31, 2011: The story about GE not paying US federal income tax keeps getting more embarrassing for the administration and GE. GE says they did not pay any US federal income tax in 2010 because the company last $32 billion in the financial banking meltdown. He said today on CNBC that when things get back to normal, GE's effective tax rate would be back to its more normal "teens to 20's." In fact, the last year that GE paid federal income tax, their rate was 9 percent. The corporate statutory rate is 35%. GE owns 49% of CNBC. Comcast owns 51% of CNBC. Comcast's tax rate this year was 41%.  GE's CEO is the president's economic adviser. (Note: This was CNBC as I heard it at 2:20 p.m., March 31, 2011. I believe what I typed was accurate.)

March 28, 2011: After posting the comment about GE not paying taxes this year (as reported by CNBC), someone wrote me saying that XOM had not paid US federal taxes in years. Of course, that was incorrect, and was discussed in the comment section below.  Interestingly enough, CNBC touched on this subject again today, and put up two slides. The first slide listed four Forturne 500 companies that paid less than the statutory corporate tax rate (35%). That slide did not include any oil companies. The second slide had three companies, and the top two were XOM and COP. XOM had an effective 42% US federal tax rate for 2010, and COP had an effective 41% US federal tax rate for 2010, double the average tax rate paid by Fortune 500 companies. The average effective tax rate paid by Fortune 500 companies is 20%. The good news: if XOM and COP have effective tax rates above 40%, they both had very good years. ATT had a negative tax rate for 2010 according to CNBC, which I assume means they carried losses forward (with or without a gain this year) to result in no taxes being paid, and carrying tax losses forward.

Later, same day as original post: I've raised the issue some time ago about President Obama appointing GE/CEO as the nation's economic czar. Others are joining the fray now that "we" learn that GE paid no federal income taxes last year. 

Original Post

CNBC opening bell:

GE paid no taxes last year; took bailout money; CEO is economic czar.

Can't make this stuff up. GE paid no taxes last year -- if true, I paid more taxes than GE last year. CNBC pundits want corporate tax rate cut. What am I missing?

GE is diversifying rapidly into oil. I guess GE wants to to get into an industry where they can pay some taxes.

Here's the printed media link. 

By the way, send me the links of US oil companies not paying any federal income tax and I will link them, also.