Straight from the gut: I didn’t mean it

BOSTON: Former General Electric chief executive officer Jack Welch said he ���really stepped in it��� with his comment on CNBC On Wednesday that successor Jeffrey Immelt had a ���credibility issue��� after missing profit estimates.

���I was getting all these e-mails from the media with different pictures of what I said,��� Welch said on CNBC on Thursday. ���And nothing, nothing, nothing is as disgusting to me as some old CEO chirping away about how things aren���t as good under the new guy as they were under him. That���s the last thing that I would be involved in. If I had something bad to say, I never would���ve gone on.���

Welch returned to the GE-owned financial news network this morning following a two-hour live appearance on Wednesday in which he said Immelt has a credibility issue following the company���s first-quarter earnings miss. He said that he wanted to set the record straight on his support for the company and Immelt, whom he called a ���hell of a CEO.���

GE on April 11 forecast profit of $2.20 to $2.30 a share for 2008, down from the prior $2.42 Immelt had repeated as recently as March 13, citing financial market turmoil that cut the value of investments and thwarted end-of-quarter dealmaking. The shares fell the most in more than two decades that day. Immelt���s forecasting and strategy were questioned by some investors and analysts.

���In an effort to put GE���s first-quarter earnings miss in context, I really stepped in it,��� CNBC reported Welch as saying in his BusinessWeek column tomorrow.

���Much to my shock and horror remarks I made on CNBC���s Squawk Box about the performance of GE and CEO Jeff Immelt were interpreted to mean the exact opposite of what I intended. Nothing is worse than having a predecessor perceived as commenting negatively on a successor, particularly when the successor is doing a terrific job in a difficult environment. I want to set the record straight.���

Immelt told investors on April 11 he will stick to his strategy for profit growth. In the first quarter, GE Infrastructure, the biggest segment, beat the company���s own revenue forecast and had a profit gain of 17%. Last year was also the first time more than half of total company revenue came from overseas, another strategy to steady growth.

General Electric's finance-related businesses accounted for 44% of net income and 53% of profit from continuing operations last year, according to its annual US Securities and Exchange filings.

���GE���s a great company with a great model with a hell of a CEO who���s reshuffled the business portfolio to make it stronger for the next decade,��� Welch told CNBC today.

���And all this nonsense that���s been buzzing around for the last week is just silly talk. I am 100% supportive of everything going on there.��� GE rose 25 cents to $32.23 on Wednesday in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. The shares, which are down 8.4% in the past year, dropped to as low as $32.10 in trading before markets opened on Thursday.