GENERAL ELECTRIC CO (GE) — Fundamental Analysis

General Electric has undergone one of the most dramatic corporate transformations in recent memory. After years of painful losses, massive revenue declines, and complex restructuring — including spinning off its healthcare and energy businesses — the company that emerged is a far leaner aerospace-focused enterprise operating as GE Aerospace. That refocused business is now generating consistent profits, with net margins in the mid-to-high teens, growing revenue, and a current ratio that signals adequate short-term liquidity. The tradeoff is that reported revenues are a fraction of what GE once posted as a conglomerate, making long-horizon growth rates look deeply negative — but that's a story of intentional shrinkage, not business failure. The most recent quarter shows strong operating momentum, with operating margins approaching 44% and EBITDA of over $6 billion. Overall, GE today looks financially healthier and more focused than it has in well over a decade.

Snapshot & Big Picture

The GE of today is essentially a new company compared to the industrial conglomerate that topped $117 billion in annual revenue a decade ago. Through a series of divestitures and spin-offs — most notably GE HealthCare (2023) and GE Vernova (2024) — the company shed enormous revenue alongside enormous complexity. What remains is GE Aerospace, a high-margin, services-heavy business supplying jet engines and aviation systems to commercial and defense customers. The revenue base has stabilized and begun growing again: from $29.1 billion in 2022 to $38.7 billion in 2024 and $45.9 billion in fiscal year 2025. Profitability has followed suit, with net margins now firmly positive after a brutal stretch of losses between 2017 and 2021.

Note: Current ratio and debt-to-equity figures were not available in the 10-K filings for fiscal years 2015–2018. The 2023 net margin was elevated partly due to one-time items related to the spin-off activity. Debt-to-equity has risen since 2022 as the company's equity base was restructured following divestitures.

Latest Quarter Snapshot

The most recent data available comes from the 10-Q filed July 16, 2026, covering the quarter ended June 30, 2026 — making it more current than the annual figures above. This quarter provides the clearest picture of where GE Aerospace stands operationally right now.

The gross margin of 52.6% and operating margin of nearly 44% reflect the high-value, services-rich nature of GE Aerospace's business — long-term engine service agreements generate recurring, high-margin revenue streams. The current ratio dipped just below 1.0 this quarter, which warrants monitoring but is not unusual for a company with strong recurring cash flows from multi-year contracts. Net margin of 17.75% is robust and consistent with recent annual performance. EBITDA and gross margin data were not available in the annual 10-K filings provided, so these quarterly figures offer a valuable window into underlying profitability structure.

Profitability

GE's profitability history over the past decade is a story of catastrophic lows followed by genuine, sustained recovery. From 2017 through 2021, the company recorded net losses in four out of five years — including a staggering -23% net margin in 2018, when massive goodwill impairments and restructuring charges tore through the income statement. The return to consistent profitability began in earnest in 2022 (just barely positive at 1.2%), accelerated sharply in 2023 (26.8%, aided by spin-off-related gains), and has since settled into a steadier mid-to-high-teens range: 16.9% in 2024 and 19.0% in 2025. The most recent quarter (Q2 2026) shows net margin of 17.75%, suggesting 2026 is tracking in a similar range. EBITDA, gross margin, and operating margin figures were not available in the annual 10-K filings included here, limiting the full picture of profitability structure at the annual level — though the quarterly data fills in some of those gaps with impressive numbers.

Financial Health

GE's balance sheet has been substantially reshaped by its restructuring. The current ratio has remained above 1.0 in each of the reported annual periods (ranging from 1.04 to 1.55), though it slipped to 0.98 in Q2 2026 — a mild yellow flag worth watching. Debt-to-equity has risen meaningfully since 2022, from 0.11 to 1.19 by fiscal year 2025 and 1.27 as of Q2 2026. This increase reflects the post-spin-off capital structure rather than aggressive new borrowing per se, but it does mean the balance sheet carries more leverage than in the immediate post-divestiture period.

Capital Expenditures: CapEx data was not available in the 10-K filings for fiscal years 2015 through 2020. From 2021 onward, the trend is as follows:

Capital intensity is low and relatively stable, hovering in the 2–3% of revenue range. This is characteristic of a services-oriented aerospace business where intellectual property and long-term service contracts — rather than heavy physical plant — drive value. The gradual dollar increase in CapEx from $662M in 2022 to $1,273M in 2025 likely reflects reinvestment in manufacturing capacity and technology as the business grows, but the ratio-to-revenue remains modest, which supports healthy free cash flow generation.

Growth

Interpreting GE's revenue growth requires important context: the dramatic revenue declines over five- and ten-year windows are almost entirely the result of deliberate divestitures and spin-offs, not organic business deterioration. The three-year CAGR, which captures the post-spin-off era, tells a very different and more relevant story for the current business.

The five- and ten-year CAGRs appear deeply negative, but this is almost entirely a function of comparing the old conglomerate GE — which included GE Capital, GE Healthcare, GE Power, and other major units — to the streamlined GE Aerospace of today. These figures reflect the massive reduction in corporate scope, not a shrinking aerospace business. The three-year CAGR of +16.3%, measured from 2022 to 2025, is the most meaningful indicator for the current entity and points to strong, accelerating organic growth as aviation demand has rebounded post-pandemic and GE Aerospace has benefited from elevated engine deliveries and services volume.

Source Filings

• 10-Q filed July 16, 2026 — period ended June 30, 2026
• 10-Q filed April 21, 2026 — period ended March 31, 2026