Uber Takes a Victory Lap While Lyft Shares Fall Off a Cliff

The rideshare wars hit an inflection level on Wednesday as Uber’s newest earnings announcement confirmed its income greater than doubled from this time final 12 months. That information got here simply hours after Lyft announced a quarterly outlook that missed investor expectations by greater than $50 million and its inventory worth went into freefall.

In Q1 2022, Uber reported its income grew from $2.9 billion to $6.85 billion. The firm expects continued development as experience demand in April matched the pre-pandemic ranges of 2019, and locations the worth of bookings in Q2 between $28.5 billion and $29.5 billion.

“Our results demonstrate just how much progress we’ve made navigating out of the pandemic and how the power of our platform is differentiating our business performance,” mentioned Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi in a press release. “In April, Mobility Gross Bookings exceeded 2019 levels across all regions and use cases.”

The Wall Street Journal pointed to Uber’s pivot to meals supply as a serious driver of income. During the pandemic, customers stopped calling for rides and began utilizing different apps to order food and groceries. Uber, nevertheless, was in a position to incentivize drivers and clients to stick with the corporate as Uber pivoted into UberEats. This growth of the corporate’s companies appears to be price it as supply bookings grew 157% from final 12 months. The firm additionally mentioned that income per energetic rider was on the second-highest it’s ever been and its whole variety of energetic drivers was up greater than 40% 12 months over 12 months.

Lyft just isn’t faring so properly as the corporate’s adjusted earnings brought on shares to fall 2.4% on Tuesday and 26% in after-hours buying and selling. Lyft mentioned it anticipated adjusted earnings earlier than curiosity, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) in Q2 between $10 million and $20 million in an earnings name transcribed by Motley Fool. Lyft additionally noticed a 10% decrease in income from final quarter. The firm mentioned it’s going to spend money on incentives to draw drivers which might be more and more selecting to go together with rivals.

While Uber appears to be having a greater morning than Lyft, the Journal highlighted the truth that each firms are down round 30% this 12 months. And, as all the time, keep in mind that each firms’ financials are principally pretend.