Chrysler Only Lost $199M This Quarter

Chrysler lost $199 million in the fourth quarter, but that qualified as good news for the beleaguered automaker—after all, it lost a whopping $2.7 billion over the same period in 2009, the AP reports. The company says it expects to jump to profitability in 2011, setting the stage for an IPO toward the end of the year.

But don't break out the confetti just yet; that fourth-quarter loss was more than twice the $84 million the company lost in the third quarter, and revenues dipped as well. Analysts had expected only a $99 million loss. Still, on the whole, Chrysler looks a lot healthier than it did in 2009. "I was very skeptical of the prospects initially when this all started," one Morningstar analyst told Bloomberg. "So far, they’re proving me wrong and proving nearly everyone else out there wrong." (More Chrysler stories.)