Uber is profitable so why do you think it doesn't work?

Because the competition hasn't gone out of business (at least outside the US where tons of other ride hailing apps are available in most major locales) and because 16 (SIXTEEN!!!) years after founding Uber is still net profit negative: over its lifetime it has lost more money than it made.

The only people that really benefited from Uber are:

- Uber executives

- early investors that saw the share price go up

- early customers that got VC subsidized rides

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simianwords 2 days ago | parent [-]

Are you predicting that they can't be net profitable?

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oblio 2 days ago | parent [-]

No, I'm predicting that:

1. opportunity costs are a thing.

2. if you add Uber's financial numbers since creation, the crazy amount of VC that was invested Uber would have provided better returns by investing it in the S&P 500.

3. Uber will settle in as a boring, profitable company that's going to be a side note in both the history of tech and also of transportation and will primarily be remembered for eroding worker rights.

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simianwords 2 days ago | parent [-]

I don't get your point. You would have still made more money investing in Uber than in S&P.

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oblio 2 days ago | parent [-]

No, you wouldn't have, unless you were one of handful VCs or Uber execs (ok, and a bunch of pre-IPO Uber employees).

Uber IPO May 2019: market cap $82bn. Uber now: $193bn. 2.35x multiplier.

S&P 500 May 2019: $2750. S&P 500 now: $6460. 2.35x multiplier.

So the much, much riskier Uber investment has barely matched a passive S&P 500 investment over the same time frame. And the business itself has lost money, more money was put into it than has been gotten back so far.

I'm not even sure why I'm in this conversation as it seems ideological. I bring up facts and you bring up... vibes?

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simianwords 2 days ago | parent [-]

Let me get this straight.

I was replying to this: "So far Lyft seems to be doing okay, which proves the business plan doesn't really work." when I said Uber is profitable

Your retort to that was S&P grew more than Uber, which is a nonsensical argument. Our standard for what is a good business is if it grows faster than S&P after going public?

Edit: I dug up some research related to this, most companies do worse than S&P after becoming public. What's your point then?

	▲	nly 12 hours ago \| parent [-]
		Most people can't invest in a company pre-IPO, so it's irrelevant The same is currently true of Anthropic.