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 The company also said Thursday its latest round of early retirement and buyout offers netted 4,200 hourly workers, fewer than Ford had targeted.
Ford says it earned 5 cents per share in the January-March period. The No. 2 U.S.-based automaker lost $282 million, or 15 cents a share, in the same period last year.
Excluding special items, the company said it made $525 million after taxes, or 20 cents per share. That beat Wall Street's expectations. Thirteen analysts surveyed by Thomson Financial had predicted a loss of 16 cents per share.
It was Ford's first profitable quarter since the second quarter of 2007 when it made $750 million. Ford reported a full-year loss of $2.7 billion last year, and it cautioned that the rest of this year will be tough.
"The remainder of 2008 will be a challenge but we are cautiously optimistic despite the external challenges," CEO Alan Mulally said in a statement. "Our plan is working."
Ford also lowered its industrywide U.S. vehicle sales forecast for the full year to a range of 15.3 million to 15.6 million. In January it had expected full-year sales of 16 million.
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 The profit came despite a $45 million pretax loss in Ford's core North American automotive market. That was an improvement over a $613 million loss in the year-ago quarter, driven by $1.2 billion in cost reductions.
Company spokesman Mark Truby said Ford may offer additional buyout and early retirement packages on a plant-by-plant basis to further reduce its blue-collar work force.
Ford reported first quarter revenue of $39.4 billion, down from $43 billion a year ago due to the sale of its Jaguar-Land Rover and Aston Martin units. Excluding the sale, revenue would have been up slightly, the company said.
[Associated Press; By TOM KRISHER]
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