GE Slumps to Lowest Level in Four Years

With shares of General Electric (GE Quote) hitting a four-year low on Monday, the drumbeat on Wall Street for a drastic restructuring at the industrial conglomerate is getting louder.

The stock was recently down 40 cents, or 1.4%, to $28.75. Earlier, it slipped as low as $28.46 after JPMorgan analyst C. Stephen Tusa Jr. cut GE to neutral from overweight, according to a research note to investors.

"In an environment in which hitting numbers was religion, managers are paid to make the plan whatever way they can, and misses are not excused," Tusa said about the culture at GE. "This may create a situation that lends itself to putting off the bad news to see if something opens up, a risky way to operate with investors, especially in a more challenging environment."

Those comments struck a chord with investors, who are still feeling burned by GE's unexpected drop in first-quarter profit that it blamed on weakness in its financial and real estate operations. After sounding a bullish note about the quarter in mid-March, the company reported earnings from continuing operations of 44 cents a share for the period, down 8% from last year and well below expectations for 51 cents.

GE also lowered its 2009 earnings outlook in April from $2.42 to between $2.20 and $2.30 a share.

The company is known as a dependable manager of earnings on Wall Street, giving more drama to the rare miss. Former CEO Jack Welch added fuel to the fire in an interview on CNBC shortly after the report where he made sharply critical comments about his successor, Jeff Immelt, that he later retracted.