WASHINGTON (dpa) – General Motors Co on Wednesday posted a net loss of $4.3 billion from July to December in its first profit report since exiting bankruptcy in the US government's grasp.

Nearly all of the loss came in North America, where the car market struggled through much of 2009. The losses included a one-time $2.6- billion pay-out to a health fund for retired union workers.

GM reported global revenue of 57.5 billion dollars over the July-December period. For the fourth quarter of 2009, GM posted a loss of $3.4 billion on revenues of $32.3 billion.

In Europe, GM lost $813 million over the second half of 2009 on revenues of $6.8 billion.

GM emerged from bankruptcy on July 10 under majority control of the US government. Wednesday's release marks the first step towards the carmaker's rejoining the stock market, but executives would not say when GM might consider going public again.

GM lost more than $30 billions in 2008 after a decade of steadily shrinking market share. The US economic crisis helped push GM over the edge, forcing it into a 40-day bankruptcy in June 2009.

Since leaving bankruptcy, GM has been in the process of shrinking production, cutting structural labour and health costs and shedding loss-making brands including Pontiac, Saturn and Hummer.

After watching vehicle sales plummet nearly 30 percent over the course of 2009, GM reported a 17 percent gain in sales over the first three months of this year.

GM Chief Financial Officer Chris Liddell reiterated that GM would pay back all emergency government loans by June and said there was ''a good chance'' that the largest US carmaker could return to profitability in 2010.