国际英语新闻：Ford Q3 earnings up 68 percent

CHICAGO, Oct. 26 (Xinhua) -- Ford Motor Co.'s third-quarter net income rose 68 percent, with an earnings of 1.7 billion U.S. dollars -- beating analysts' estimates, Ford announced on Tuesday.

It was Ford's sixth straight quarterly profit.

"All our business units should be profitable in the fourth quarter and next year," Ford Chief Financial Officer Lewis Booth said this morning.

Significantly, the automaker will have as much cash as debt by year's end, achieving that target a year ahead of schedule.

The blue Ford logo is seen on top of the Ford Motor Co. headquarters in Dearborn, Michigan December 16, 2009.

The automaker ended the second quarter with 21.9 billion dollars in cash and 27.3 billion dollars in debt for net debt of 5. 4 billion dollars.

At the end of September, cash was at 23.8 billion dollars and debt was 26.4 billion dollars, for net debt of 2.6 billion dollars.

As of Friday, Ford will have reduced debt by 10.8 billion dollars so far this year.

The automaker has not ruled out further debt reduction in the fourth quarter, as it works to return to investment grade status and equal the playing field with Chrysler Group LLC and General Motors Co., which used bankruptcy to shed debt.

This is the highest third-quarter net income since 1990, Ford says. The last time the automaker was net cash positive was the second quarter of 2008.

The third-quarter income of 43 cents per share beats analysts' expectations of 38 cents. Pre-tax operating profit totaled 2.1 billion dollars or 48 cents a share, which is up 1.1 billion dollars from a year ago.