After yesterday’s reporting of simply brutal sales numbers for June and the first half of 2008, General Motors stock took a major dive today. GM stock fell by over 14 percent to a price of around ten dollars per, its lowest point in decades.

The exceptionally poor showing for The General so far in 2008 has got analysts over at Merrill Lynch spewing some serious negativity, going so far as to say that bankruptcy for the company is “not an impossibility”. According to Lynch, GM has got roughly $27 billion in cash on hand and will need $10 billion per annum to run its normal business affairs, plus another $10 to $15 billion to right the ship. Merrill Lynch analyst John Murphy has also cut GM’s rating from “buy” to “underperform”.

Wall Street gurus can be, and often are, just plain wrong about these things, but the news is a bit unsettling in any event. Would you bet the farm on GM avoiding bankruptcy, or is the worst still to come automaker? Have your say, in comments.

+ Jalopnik: Merrill Lynch: GM Bankruptcy Is "Not An Impossibility," Stock Price Plummets