General Motors (GM) shares rose Wednesday, as the automaker announced a new $10 billion stock buyback program. In an interview with Yahoo Finance's Brian Sozzi, GM CEO Mary Barra explains how the moves aim is to boost a battered share price that she's "not happy with."

Barra notes headwinds like the pandemic, chip shortages, and recent UAW labor tensions have introduced volatility and uncertainty. She believes instituting the buyback will bring "certainty" while signaling confidence in GM's future even if macroeconomic challenges persist.

Click here to watch the full interview with GM CEO Mary Barra or you can watch this full episode of Yahoo Finance Live here.

Video Transcript

- This is a really big number, Mary. Very headline grabbing. Why do you think you needed to do this and send that message to investors?

MARY BARRA: Well I think we're not happy. And I personally am not happy with where the share price is. And I think when we look at what we've been through from COVID, from semiconductor shortages. And then from the uncertainty around the UAW strike and the labor situation more broadly, we are-- we have certainty now.

And we always have had a capital allocation framework. And our target cash was, on average, around $18 to $20 billion. And so when you look at that and you look at the cash that we had, we thought this was the right thing to do to return it to our owners.

- When you're out there talking to investors, what's some of their biggest concerns? Because I've talked a lot with your CFO Paul Jacobson and every time I talk to him, the outlook is better than expected, the guidance has been raised. Before the UAW situation, what have investors been missing?

MARY BARRA: Well, I think investors like certainty. And I think until we got the agreement ratified with the UAW and with Unifor in Canada I think that was an important milestone. I'm disappointed this year that we haven't delivered more Ultium based EVs out into the marketplace. That's not an issue with the Ultium platform in general, it was really an automation issue that we will be working our way out of-- we've made progress. Well, each quarter will continue to make progress and we'll be out of that by the middle of next year.

I think-- but demonstrating. We've got to execute. We've got to prove that we're going to have EVs people want to buy, I'm confident. And then with the recent incidents at Cruze, we've got to demonstrate what the right path forward and we will. I think when we do those and continue to demonstrate that we're going to have growth, strong cash flow, strong margins, I think they'll believe. And I think this was sending a very strong signal that we have confidence that we will.