DETROIT (Reuters) - General Motors Corp Chief Operating Officer Fritz Henderson on Tuesday said the automaker expected to receive a delayed U.S. government loan payment in the next several days that it needs to avoid running out of cash.
GM received an initial $4 billion in emergency funding from the U.S. Treasury on December 31 and had expected to receive its NEXT (NXT.LO)$5.4-billion payment from the government last Friday.
That payment was delayed, Henderson said, in part because the automaker was pressed to submit additional information. "We expect to receive it in the next several days," Henderson said of the second loan tranche.
Without the scheduled U.S. government loan disbursement, GM would "run out of cash," Henderson said in response to a question about whether the automaker could rule out a bankruptcy filing.
In total, the U.S. government has pledged to loan $13.4 billion to GM for three years provided that it demonstrates that it has a plan to pay back the loans and become viable.
(Reporting by Kevin Krolicki; editing by Carol Bishopric)
