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Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

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Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#121

Post by bunderbunder »

btilly wrote: post #52
georgeecollins wrote: post #23

I don't know what to say about this because as a lifelong value investor I cannot accept the valuation of Uber based on it's earnings. But the same logic held me back from investing in Facebook and Google, which did not make any sense to me at the moment of their IPO. How do I decide what Uber's earnings will be in five years?

Warren Buffett's advice on this is simple. If he doesn't understand it, he doesn't invest. No matter what the rest of the world thinks. He famously missed the dot com boom. And in the middle of it, gave a private speech about exactly why, about how few of those companies were likely to be around in a few years even if the internet were exactly as successful as hoped for. He was widely derided as being behind the time…

And it's not like he just flat out didn't invest all the money he wasn't putting into Geocities and Lycos. He was just putting it into other things, mostly stuff that was less the hot new thing, and therefore less in demand, and therefore more favorably priced.

I don't think he regrets his conservatism. From 1990 through now, BRK.A is up 4,200%, while the NASDAQ composite is up only 1,500%.

Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#122

Post by dragonwriter »

ghaff wrote: post #104
dragonwriter wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The theory of why normal credit card rewards aren't taxable is that they are a discount. OTOH, if it's a corporate expensed card or purchase, but the discount goes to the employee, it seems that either: (1) the “reimbursement” for the full cost isn't all bona-fide reimbursement, since you are getting reimbursement for more than you paid after the discount, and therefore should be taxed like any other compensation fro…

It’s mostly (with some exemptions) formal policy from the IRS. I suspect the real justification is that a lot of these things are hard to value, the numbers are small in the scheme of things, and compliance would be very low. It actually makes a lot of sense not to put a rule in the books everyone would ignore.

That makes sense, more of an administrative optimization around thw current conditions than an administrative failure.

OTOH, that makes it an unstable thing to build a business model on expanding, since the more significant it becomes with entities other than credit card firms exploiting it as a marketing and loyalty tool, the less it remains the case that it is efficient to let it slide.

Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#123

Post by justfor1comment »

komali2 wrote: post #119
justfor1comment wrote: post #80

Uber is getting more expensive with time as they try to consolidate losses. For my commute to work nowadays Express Pool costs the same as UberX did a year ago. And of course express pool includes overtly long sight seeing detours and dangerous pick up/drop off points. This is getting prohibitively expensive and I plan to switch to an electric scooter + public transit in a few months.

> dangerous pick up/drop off points Dangerous in what way? By what measure? > public transit How does the previous danger measurement compare to your average ride on public transit?

I have had pick up points on ramps of highways which I am describing as dangerous. As you can see this is not a danger I would face on public transit.

Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#124

Post by rockinghigh »

justfor1comment wrote: post #80

Uber is getting more expensive with time as they try to consolidate losses. For my commute to work nowadays Express Pool costs the same as UberX did a year ago. And of course express pool includes overtly long sight seeing detours and dangerous pick up/drop off points. This is getting prohibitively expensive and I plan to switch to an electric scooter + public transit in a few months.

> Express Pool costs the same as UberX did a year ago

This is very unlikely.

Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#125

Post by joshe »

cyan_atrus wrote: post #35
joshe wrote: post #26

What is Uber's long term moat/pricing power? To compete in a local market you just need to sign up 5000 or so drivers. At a $5 signup bonus that costs like $25,000. You can just be the third app, most drivers already swap between Lyft/Uber. You could even form a drivers cooperative and just give all the charges to drivers (like farmers do). Regulatory capture seems like the only real route to sustainable profits with…

not that it necessarily changes your argument, but the signup bonuses that uber / lyft offer are significantly higher than $5 (closer to $1k), and are structured in such a way to ensure you're not dual-apping. "A different model of what they are doing is using their massive revenue growth (not profit) to raise money to fund a search for real pricing power with food delivery, shared bikes, and Uber freight." I suspect…

Totally agree about the higher sign up bonuses.

Though they are really offering higher driver pay for a limited time on signup. To compete I'd just offer that higher driver pay all the time by taking less fees than Uber. Not correcting you or anything, just embroidering.

Over 10 years or so, this devolves into the taxi business, which without medallions is very low margin. [1]

[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/lensherman/2017/12/14/why-cant-...

Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#126

Post by aviv »

justfor1comment wrote: post #80

Uber is getting more expensive with time as they try to consolidate losses. For my commute to work nowadays Express Pool costs the same as UberX did a year ago. And of course express pool includes overtly long sight seeing detours and dangerous pick up/drop off points. This is getting prohibitively expensive and I plan to switch to an electric scooter + public transit in a few months.

If a couple dollar difference is that big of a deal, you need to focus your effort on making more money, not switching to a cheaper alternative. The problem is not Uber raising prices, it's you wasting time commuting to the wrong job. I mean this in a good way, not trying to be rude.

Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#127

Post by joshe »

treis wrote: post #76
joshe wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure right now. But long term? They don't seem to have any kind of moat at all. They can't actually do that because it messes with the contractor thing, but they can do what they are doing with the rewards for a certain amount of availability. But still I could just halve the amount I take from the transaction and give it to drivers. That's surely better for the drivers. Moat is about them having a long term advantag…

>Sure right now. But long term? They don't seem to have any kind of moat at all. They also have the moat of providing a reasonably good service with network effects. How would you come in and beat the Uber/Lyft duopoly? They can copy any innovation you come up with and have the capital to beat you in a price war.

Businesses where you burn capital on price wars are low margin businesses.

Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#128

Post by icedchai »

munk-a wrote: post #86
sherlock_h wrote: post #31

Over the long run, at least in the U.S. it seems like Uber/Lyft are edging towards a comfortable duopoly. Usually their prices move in lockstep (each has insights into the other company's prices through email receipt intelligence, credit card intelligence, webscraping, etc.). And their services are fairly exchangeable. For either one to win there needs to be either a massive cost advantage or some sort of stickiness…

And this will last until... self-driving cars enter the picture and bankrupt them both.

That's a ton of time. Self-driving cars are decades out.

Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#129

Post by bamboozled »

komali2 wrote: post #118
burlesona wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I highly recommmend the electric scooter. So fast and so fun. I got this one: https://ecorecoscooter.com/product/l5

Or, a bicycle. You can get a good one on craigslist for a hundred bucks if you're patient. You may get a bit sweatier but you'll get an exercise ;) Or, there's no hills, and you go your own pace, and it's fine. Having tried both I do feel bicycles are safer - those tiny scooter wheels shake me to pieces.

Another thing I like about bikes is that it can be really therapeutic to perform your own tweaks, maintenance and repairs. Yesterday fitted new break pads and it’s such a pleasure to ride and is satisfying as hell.

Re: Uber Revenue Growth Slows, Losses Persist as 2019 IPO Draws Near

#130

Post by celticninja »

maxxxxx wrote: post #40
sherlock_h wrote: post #31

Over the long run, at least in the U.S. it seems like Uber/Lyft are edging towards a comfortable duopoly. Usually their prices move in lockstep (each has insights into the other company's prices through email receipt intelligence, credit card intelligence, webscraping, etc.). And their services are fairly exchangeable. For either one to win there needs to be either a massive cost advantage or some sort of stickiness…

Until the money runs out.

It's a race to either profitability or the death of the opposition, at which point subsidies disappear and prices rise, so does Ubers cut of the fares.
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