The Motley Fool on $U (Nov 4, 2026)

Uber reported this morning. Uber did report this morning. Did you look at that one? We can chat about that quick. Uh yeah, I think well one the stock is up 6% was up I think a bit more.

Gross bookings was up 20% year-over-year again. I think next quarter they expected to be up again 20%. uh mobility revenue was down a bit, but that's also because of the business changes that they had to make in the UK. So, that impacted it,

right? So, can we explain that for just a second? Um, and I'll let me pull up uh because the the way to the best way to explain it is is by showing the total gross bookings versus revenue.

So when um when Uber has a ride, they they book that as a gross booking, which is what you have in blue here. So last quarter 59 of almost $60 billion worth of gross bookings, but then what they account for as revenue is only the the percentage that they keep in the UK.

And this is a UK law, right? This isn't um I'm I'm not super clear on like who made the decision, but I don't think it was Uber's decision about uh how I think how how it was accounted for.

But in the UK, the total gross booking number was what they accounted for as revenue and then that changed at the beginning of this year to be the net number. So as a result, year-over-year the growth looks slower.

In the UK specifically, it probably looks like growth is negative, but your operating margin is going to be exactly the your like your cost of sales, your operating profit, all that kind of stuff is going to be exactly the same.

So, it looks like like revenue growth slows, you know, but operating margin and look at these are uh cyclical a little bit. So, we'll just do trailing 12 months. Operating margin continues to go up and to the right.

So, just I just want to give some context on that if you weren't weren't aware.

Yeah. But the delivery segment is now I think the the biggest segments. It has now outgrown uh mobility which to me is is great because people say oh mobility is going away but the delivery is doing is doing quite well.

Freight is also growing now for the second consecutive quarter. We're seeing a lot of growth. Still still unprofitable but but getting there to break even.

They are expecting around 700 fully self-driving cars by the end of this year. Uh over 2,000 by the end of next year. And then I was surprised that that number wasn't bigger. By the way, the 2,000 number, if you're at 700 this year, if it's not bigger, then I guess it's because their partners might not be able to to increase the feed by so much.

But anyways, as of right now, it doesn't seem like this is affecting them that much. Um, they don't have a demand issue. they they said they had some supply issues which is why it impacted the business a little bit in I think Brazil, India and another market but they said that the trend in October looks already much better.

So, yeah, I thought it was a good C. It was interesting. Um, I just did the the Molly Fool podcast uh before this show and we didn't even talk about Uber because Uber's become kind of boring.

It's like they're just going to grow 20% year-over-year like clockwork. Their price to earnings multiple on a forward basis is 18. Price to free cash flow is 12. I think that's a great deal.

I love these boring companies that just keep compounding year after year after year.