What's going on?

Late on Thursday, ride-hailing behemoth Uber reported its first set of quarterly results as a public company � and they were better than expected, which helped lift its stock on Friday.

What does this mean?

Before its lackluster initial public offering last month, Uber gave investors a steer on what its results were likely to be. Uber�s $3 billion revenue for the first quarter of 2019 and $1 billion loss both turned out slightly better than predicted.


Uber�s costs are still surging thanks to its expansion into several new and competitive areas � like electric scooters and autonomous vehicles. Nonetheless, the company reckons that competition overall will ease, which should enable it to lower its marketing costs. That could be a result of Uber gobbling up its main Middle Eastern rival � and American nemesis Lyft perhaps throttling its own spending in the pursuit of profitability.

Why should I care?

For markets: Investors are hungry for profit.

Investors who picked up Uber�s stock on Friday may expect profit ahead (or perhaps just lesser losses) with intense price wars maybe set to calm; rival Lyft�s stock rose too. Uber�s ride-hailing business still brings home three quarters of the company�s bacon, so improving profitability there could help Uber to drive up earnings more than at bite-sized Uber Eats, where competition�s likely to heat up now hungry, hungry Amazon is back in the game.

The bigger picture: What Uber loses in profit, it makes up for in buzz.

Genuine Impact rates stocks based on characteristics like �value� (share price compared to earnings) and �momentum� (when analysts raise their earnings forecasts and recommend buying the shares) � and it says Uber falls down on value. Since it doesn�t make a profit, Uber�s stock appears expensive. But recent analyst interest in Uber�s newly listed shares has helped it rank highly for momentum�