Jun 5, 2019: Now Uber is Trading Above its IPO Price

Uber (NYSE: UBER) closed up 5% Wednesday at $45 per share. This means it is trading for the first time since its May 10 debut at its initial public offering price. Several buy ratings and positive analyst reports were released this week. This is why Uber’s stock price is trading up. On the first day of trading, many thought Uber’s IPO was a failure. It opened at only $42 a piece. Uber raised $8.1 billion in its early May float, achieving an initial market cap of roughly $70 billion. Uber was previously valued at $72 billion by venture capitalists. It is interesting that Uber could be a leader in the offline activities. Not like traditional Internet companies, Uber is a digital app that powers offline behavior and street movements. Many analysts think Uber elevates cost in the early years, but probably creates good long-term position. Uber taxi drivers and Uber Eats Food Delivery create huge amounts of revenue and market share. Unfortunately, recently there have been profit losses. Uber released its first-ever earnings report last week, disclosing losses of $1 billion in the first quarter of 2019 on revenue of $3.1 billion. Even though it is such a large loss, these numbers came in as expected by analysts. Analysts anticipate an adjusted net loss per share of 76 cents on earnings of about $3.1 billion. The step of becoming a public company is important. Uber is focused on executing their strategy to become the popular company for local transportation and commerce. The Uber chief is Dara Khosrowshahi. The company says that in the first quarter, the engagement on their platform was higher than ever, with an average of 17 million trips per day.

Another new thing is interesting with Uber, an Uber Helicopter will start offering flights from lower Manhattan to J.F.K. For an 8-minute, one-way flight, the average ride will cost $212 per person and include private ground transportation on both ends of the trip. Uber announced “Uber Elevate” – the flying division three years ago. Many dreamed that flying cars would become a reality soon. Of course, it will be a long time before flying vehicles actually exist. But, the helicopter service called Uber Copter is starting July 9 in New York City. There is a reason why the flight is between Lower Manhattan and Kennedy International Airport. This is a trip that is very frequently taken every day. By using a helicopter, there is an opportunity to save the customers a lot of time. By car, this trip takes at least an hour. In rush hour traffic, it can take more than 2 hours. It would be 50 – 75 minutes if you use the subway or the Long Island Railroad. Uber Copter would be about 30 minutes. Uber wants to create more Uber Copters in other cities. They have to get more understanding about how these flights can successfully work.