Uber loses $1.2B in the most recent quarter

By: Nicolas V.

Shares of Uber sank more than 5 percent in extended trading Monday after the company revealed it once again lost more than $1 billion during the most recent quarter.

The San Francisco-based ride-hailing giant reported $1.2 billion in losses for the fiscal third quarter as it continued to hand out discounts amid stiff competition with Lyft and other services.

That was three months after Uber reported more than $5 billion in losses as it doled out billions in employee compensation tied to the company’s May initial public offering.

Despite heavy price cuts for customers, Uber missed Wall Street’s estimates for monthly active users in the quarter, delivering 103 million riders worldwide versus the predicted 105.5 million.

Gross bookings — a key underlying metric that investors focus on — fell short of the $16.7 billion analysts were looking for, instead delivering $16.5 million, up 29 percent from a year earlier.

“Ultimately, bookings are the hearts and lungs of the business, and that was a bit softer where investors were expecting a beat,” Wedbush analyst Dan Ives said.

On the positive side, Uber actually beat Wall Street’s expectations with losses of 68 cents per share versus the 81 cents — or more than $1.5 billion — Wall Street analysts had been expecting.

Uber also brought in $3.8 billion in revenue, slightly ahead of the Street’s forecasted $3.7 billion.

Uber upped its revenue guidance for the year, adding $250 million to the figure.

Costs jumped by a third, to $4.9 billion in the quarter. Gross bookings, a measure of total value of rides before driver costs and other expenses, rose nearly 30 percent from a year earlier to $16.5 billion.

The company’s shares are expected to be under pressure on Wednesday, when the post-IPO lockup period expires. Some analysts expect more than 80 percent of the company’s outstanding shares will become eligible for sale.

“There’s fears you’ll see an avalanche of selling from insiders,” Ives said. “Some of the early investors, in my opinion, will sell at any price.”