General Motors Co.'s operational performance in recent months has exceeded our expectations and we believe that the company will likely maintain strong automotive cash flow and steady profitability in 2017 and 2018, albeit amidst slowing global automotive demand. We are upgrading General Motors Co. (GM) and its subsidiary General Motors Financial Co. Inc. (GMF) to 'BBB' from 'BBB-'. At the same time, we are raising our issue-level ratings on GM and GMF's debt to 'BBB' from 'BBB-'. The stable outlook reflects our expectation that GM will sustain EBIT margins of at least 10% in North America while generating steady automotive cash flows in China amidst increasing pricing pressure and plateauing conditions in its key markets over the next 12-24 months.
