Ford's 2015 profit jumps on stronger sales

DEARBORN, Mich. (AP) — Improving sales in most of the world helped Ford Motor Co. achieve a record pretax profit in 2015, and the company says the numbers could go even higher this year.

Full-year pretax profit jumped 48 percent to $10.8 billion as its global sales and market share grew. Ford's U.S. sales reached their highest level in a decade, and its F-Series pickup remained the best-selling vehicle in the U.S. for the 34th straight year. A change in the way Ford accounts for its pension costs also boosted pretax results.

Bob Shanks, Ford's chief financial officer, said 2015 was the "breakthrough year" Ford promised after it spent heavily in 2014 to build new plants in Asia and bring a new, aluminum-sided F-150 pickup to market in the U.S. Ford expects this year's pretax profit to be equal or higher.

"We've been saying for quite some time that we are probably at a plateau at very high absolute levels," he said. Shanks said low oil prices, low interest rates and a growing housing market in the U.S. all bode well for 2016.

Last year's results will mean a record profit-sharing check of $9,300 for each of Ford's 53,000 U.S. hourly workers.