NEW YORK (AP) - The Latest on ride-hailing giant Uber's initial public stock offering (all times local):

With a ring of the opening bell Uber is looking to pick up passengers as a newly public company. Investors waited to bet on a service with huge potential, but a long way from turning a profit.

Shares in the ride-hailing giant were sold in an initial public offering for $45 each, raising $8.1 billion, but it will take several hours for new investors to show whether they're interested. Officials expect trading to start around 11:30 a.m. Friday.

CEO Dara Khosrowshahi and other company officials stood on a balcony above the New York Stock Exchange as the bell rang to signal the start of the day's trading. Khosrowshahi posed for selfies and after the bell while controversial co-founder Travis Kalanick and other Uber officials and employees stood on the trading floor.

The IPO came in at the lower end of Uber's targeted price range of $44 to $50 per share. The caution may have been driven by escalating doubts about the ability of ride-hailing services to make money since Uber's main rival, Lyft, went public six weeks ago.

Even at the tamped-down price, Uber now has a market value of $82 billion - five times more than Lyft's.

FILE - This March 20, 2018, file photo shows the Uber app on an iPad in Baltimore. Uber is about to embark on a wild ride on Wall Street with the biggest and most hotly debated IPO in years. Uber's shares begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange, Friday, May 10, 2019. (AP Photo/Patrick Semansky, File) </s> Uber (UBER) officially began trading Friday on the New York Stock Exchange, but stumbled out of the gate as its stock settled below its $45 initial public offering price.

In Uber’s first test of whether it can transition from Silicon Valley unicorn to a publicly traded company while winning over a skeptical, volatile market, the stock — which priced at $45 on Thursday — gradually drifted lower from the $46-$48 indicated range prior the open.

In its first trade, Uber hit the market at $42 per share on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE), effectively crashing out of the preferred range that it listed for its IPO. After a choppy session, Uber ended the day at $41.60, down nearly 8% from its listing price.

Uber’s offering is the most eagerly anticipated of a wave of technology IPOs expected to hit markets this year. Yet the company has become the victim of circumstances beyond its control, with markets being roiled by fears of a U.S.-China trade war, and the weak debut of Uber’s ride-hailing competitor, Lyft (LYFT).

“Companies like Uber and Lyft have not been tested during a downturn and it is unclear how resilient their business models would be during a period of contracted consumer spending,” said Asad Hussain, an emerging technology analyst at PitchBook.

“To regain investor confidence, we believe both management teams will need to execute well over the next few quarters while maintaining robust revenue growth and convincing the market that a path to profitability exists,” Hussain added.

Credit: David Foster/Yahoo Finance More

Meanwhile, Lyft’s disappointing stock debut has clouded Uber’s prospects.

Lyft’s maiden voyage as a public company in March immediately hit rough shoals: The stock opened near $90, but quickly sank to a low of $52.78. On Friday, its stock hit a record low, underscoring investor skepticism about how either company will make money in the near term.

The stock’s woes — combined with the fact that virtually none of the tech unicorns are profitable at this juncture — is adding to Uber’s challenge. The company burned through $1 billion in the first quarter of 2019, Uber recently revealed in a regulatory filing, and has yet to chart a path toward making a profit.

“Reading the S-1 filings of these companies has been an eye-opening experience,” analysts at Bernstein noted last month.

Ride sharing accounts for just a sliver of U.S. vehicle miles traveled, which “is simultaneously the bull case and bear case here for these companies. Bulls on mobility services can claim almost limitless potential for penetration upside,” Bernstein said.

However, “Uber and Lyft each took almost a decade to get to their present scale, are seeing growth slow, and incinerate cash at impressive rates while showing modest operating leverage,” the firm added — all of which matters now that both have to report their business conditions on a regular basis.

Read more: </s> After the biggest initial public offering of the year, Uber Technologies Inc. ended its first day of trading Friday below its last private valuation. The deflated debut cast a pall over 2019’s prospects as the hottest year for tech listings this decade -- and potentially on the future of the ride-hailing industry.It took more than two hours for the stock to finally start trading after Uber executives and drivers congregated at the New York Stock Exchange for the bell-ringing ceremony. The shares debuted at $42, well below the IPO price of $45. A tense wait for those gathered on the trading floor turned into a jittery start for the newly public company, which touched its intraday high and low prices within the first hour of opening.Uber closed at $41.57, giving it a market capitalization of just $69.7 billion. The San Francisco-based company last raised private capital from Toyota Motor Corp. in August at a valuation of about $76 billion.Dara Khosrowshahi, Uber’s chief executive officer, said in an interview on the floor of the exchange Friday that trade tensions between the U.S. and China played a role in the stock’s weak performance. President Donald Trump had moved overnight to slap fresh tariffs on Chinese goods. “You can’t pick when you go public,” Khosrowshahi said.But Uber shares extended losses into the close, even as U.S. equities stabilized on renewed optimism that an all-out trade war could be averted. The tumultuous debut makes Uber the newest member of a stock market club no one would choose to join: Since the start of the decade, just seven other companies that raised more than $1 billion in their IPO have ended the first day of trading in the red.Uber’s inauguration as a public company was sure to be closely watched by the cavalcade of IPO hopefuls lining up to list in 2019. That crop includes Peloton Interactive Inc., Postmates Inc., Slack Technologies Inc. and WeWork Cos., all of which have preparations in progress to go public this year.Along with Uber, they’ll be following companies like rival Lyft Inc. , Pinterest Inc. and Beyond Meat Inc. to market. Those three offerings provide a few clues for how public market investors are going to treat unprofitable startups with huge private valuations.Beyond Meat ended the week 165% over its IPO price with a valuation of $4 billion. Pinterest extended gains to close 53% above its listing price of $19 a share. Lyft, meanwhile, followed its bigger rival down Friday, almost $21 below where it sold the stock just six weeks ago.Len Sherman, a professor at Columbia Business School, said that while too much attention is paid to trading on day one, Uber has provided enough financial information in the run-up to the IPO for investors to know what they’re buying into.“The market has reacted negatively to a shared reality that both Lyft and Uber are struggling with a fundamentally broken business model,” he said. “Uber has lost more money faster than any startup in history, with no clear path to profitability.”Uber’s losses just last year totaled $3.04 billion on an operating basis, with revenue of $11.3 billion. Its total operating losses over the past three years were more than $10 billion, according to filings.Khosrowshahi said in the interview Friday that while profitability was a priority for the company, public market investors should be judging Uber by a different metric once it starts reporting quarterly earnings. “The most important sort of statistic to look at is bookings, because that reflects essentially what people are paying for the service,” he said.In distributing the stock, Uber prioritized shareholders -- particularly institutional investors -- that it thinks will hold on to the shares for a long time. “We found a set of investors who are long-term oriented, that believe in our vision,” Khosrowshahi said. “Now we have to execute to make sure that the bet that they made on us is a great bet.”Uber sold 180 million shares for $45 each Thursday, after marketing them for $44 to $50 apiece. Even at the low end of the price range, Uber’s listing was the ninth-largest U.S. IPO of all time and the biggest on a U.S. exchange since Alibaba Group Holding Ltd.’s $25 billion global record holder in 2014, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.A market value of less than $70 billion is a considerable climb down from earlier projections: Last year, bankers jockeying to lead the offering told Uber it could be valued at as much as $120 billion in an IPO. Shares are trading under the ticker UBER. Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Bank of America Corp. led the listing. </s> The Latest: Uber stock slides almost 8% on rocky first day

NEW YORK (AP) — The Latest on ride-hailing giant Uber's initial public stock offering (all times local):

Uber capped off a rocky first day of trading on Wall Street with its shares closing at $41.57, down almost 8% from their starting price of $45.

It's uncommon for shares in a company with such a high profile to stumble out of the gate.

The disappointing performance reflects financial market turmoil due to trade tensions and lingering doubts about whether fast-growing ride-hailing companies will ever turn a profit.

Despite the volatile stock market, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi said he did not consider postponing Uber's IPO date.

Shares in Lyft, Uber's chief rival, slumped to $51.09 Friday, 29% below their IPO price.

Despite his company's rocky stock market debut, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi says he's thrilled to complete his company's IPO.

Khosrowshahi told The Associated Press Friday it was a tough week to go public, but the company got it done.

Despite the volatile stock market, Khosrowshahi said he did not consider postponing Uber's IPO date.

He stressed that Uber is not a fair-weather company and keeps moving forward in tough and easy environments. He added that the $8 billion Uber raised is crucial for the ride-hailing company's future growth plans, and called it a great moment for Uber and the employees who worked so hard.

Uber's stock was trading at about 3% lower than its IPO price Friday afternoon.

Uber's transition to becoming a publicly traded company is landing with a thud, but it's not the first to experience that, not even this week.

However, it is uncommon for a company with such a high profile to stumble out of the gate. Uber raised almost $25 billion in 23 rounds of financing before going public.

Matt Kennedy, a senior IPO market strategist at Renaissance Capital, says that over the past five years, just 10% of U.S. technology companies backed by venture capital finished their first day of trading below their IPO price.

Facebook debuted in 2012, and after technical difficulties delayed its start to trading, it ended its first day just 23 cents above its IPO price of $38. Kennedy points out that unlike Facebook, however, Uber hasn't been turning profits.

After falling close to 9% Friday, shares of Uber Technologies Inc. are down less than 1%.

Uber is suffering a terrible first day as a public company as its shares slid into negative territory in the initial moments of trading.

That's highly unusual, especially for a high-profile tech company like Uber. Shares of rid-sharing rival Lyft soared 21% at one point during its initial public offering in late March. But that company has had a rough ride since, falling almost 30% since it debuted.

Some analysts pointed to volatile market conditions over the past few weeks, and Friday as well. All major U.S. markets are in decline, having fallen 3% or more this week.

SharesPost principal analyst Alejandro Ortiz said the timing for Uber trading to start was bad with the uncertainty over the trade spat with China. He said that if you saw value in Uber at its IPO price of $45, nothing has changed in the last 48 hours.

Shares of Uber Technologies Inc. are down more than 1%, but had fallen more severely in early trading.

Uber's shares began trading about $2 below its initial public offering price of $45.

Traders scratched their heads Friday, trying to remember a high-profile IPO like Uber going south on the first day.

Shares of Lyft, a rival in the ride-sharing business, are tumbling 6%. That company has had a very rough time since it went public at the end of March. It hit a new all-time low Friday.

CEO Dara Khosrowshahi tried to control expectations, telling CNBC that Uber investors are in it for the long ride. He says the company will be judged on what it does in three to five years.

Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi (DAH-rah CAWS-row-SHAH-hee) is trying to tamp down the hype on the first day that the general public will be allowed to buy stock in the company.

Khosrowshahi says as much as he wants things to go well during Uber's first day as a public company, what's more important is what is created in the next three to five years.

Both Uber co-founders, Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp, were also present at the exchange for the opening but absent from the podium during the bell ringing.

Tony West, Uber's chief legal officer who has been working to repair Uber's image while settling lawsuits around the globe, shot smartphone videos from the floor while waiting for the first trade.

Uber becomes a publicly traded company Friday. Shares are expected to begin trading before noon.

The opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange was rung by Austin Geidt, one of Uber's earliest employees.

She joined the company in 2010 and is now head of strategy for Uber's Advanced Technologies Group, which works on autonomous vehicles. She and CEO Dara Khosrowshahi were joined by Uber drivers from around the world and other Uber executives at the NYSE.

Uber becomes a publicly traded company Friday. Shares are expected to begin trading before noon.

With a ring of the opening bell Uber is looking to pick up passengers as a newly public company. Investors waited to bet on a service with huge potential, but a long way from turning a profit.

Shares in the ride-hailing giant were sold in an initial public offering for $45 each, raising $8.1 billion, but it will take several hours for new investors to show whether they're interested. Officials expect trading to start around 11:30 a.m. Friday.

CEO Dara Khosrowshahi and other company officials stood on a balcony above the New York Stock Exchange as the bell rang to signal the start of the day's trading. Khosrowshahi posed for selfies and after the bell while controversial co-founder Travis Kalanick and other Uber officials and employees stood on the trading floor.

The IPO came in at the lower end of Uber's targeted price range of $44 to $50 per share. The caution may have been driven by escalating doubts about the ability of ride-hailing services to make money since Uber's main rival, Lyft, went public six weeks ago.

Even at the tamped-down price, Uber now has a market value of $82 billion — five times more than Lyft's. </s> With shady tactics employed on both sides, which service do Aussies prefer: Uber or taxis?

Uber vs Taxis: which is better? 1:22

Uber’s transition to becoming a publicly traded company is landing with a thud, but it’s not the first to experience that, not even this week.

However, it is uncommon for a company with such a high profile to stumble out of the gate.

And traders scratched their heads Friday, trying to remember a high-profile IPO like Uber going south on the first day.

Uber’s shares began trading about $US2 ($A2.86) below its initial public offering price of $US45 ($A64.26).

At the closing bell on Friday it was at $US41.57, whioh is a drop of 7.6%.

Uber raised almost $US25 billion ($A35.69) in 23 rounds of financing before going public.

Matt Kennedy, a senior IPO market strategist at Renaissance Capital, says that over the past five years, just 10% of U.S. technology companies backed by venture capital finished their first day of trading below their IPO price.

Facebook debuted in 2012, and after technical difficulties delayed its start to trading, it ended its first day just 23 cents above its IPO price of $US38 ($A54.25).

Kennedy points out that unlike Facebook, however, Uber hasn’t been turning profits.

After falling close to 9% Friday, shares of Uber Technologies Inc. are down less than 1%.

That’s highly unusual, especially for a high-profile tech company like Uber. Shares of rid-sharing rival Lyft soared 21% at one point during its initial public offering in late March. But that company has had a rough ride since, falling almost 30% since it debuted.

Some analysts pointed to volatile market conditions over the past few weeks, and Friday as well. All major U.S. markets are in decline, having fallen 3% or more this week.

Both Uber co-founders, Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp, were present at the exchange for the opening but absent from the podium during the bell ringing.

Tony West, Uber’s chief legal officer who has been working to repair Uber’s image while settling lawsuits around the globe, shot smartphone videos from the floor while waiting for the first trade.

The opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange was rung by Austin Geidt, one of Uber’s earliest employees.

She joined the company in 2010 and is now head of strategy for Uber’s Advanced Technologies Group, which works on autonomous vehicles. She and CEO Dara Khosrowshahi were joined by Uber drivers from around the world and other Uber executives at the NYSE. </s> Last year, bankers jockeying to lead the offering told Uber it could be valued at as much as $US120 billion in an IPO. This year, widely expected to be the busiest for mega US tech listings this century, started with a partial government shutdown that shuttered the agency that approves IPO documents for 35 days, all but killing activity in the first quarter. After submitting its confidential filing in December, Uber -- along with rival Lyft and a host of other hopefuls -- was left sitting on the sidelines while US stocks enjoyed the best start to a year in at least a decade. Today, the picture looks very different. Companies have been rushing to market, with Lyft, Pinterest and Tradeweb Markets all raising more than $US1 billion each since late March. Markets, meanwhile, aren't looking so hot. US stocks fell for a third day on Wednesday as trade tensions escalated between the US and China, extending the 2 per cent loss that started the week.

"They're looking at the market as well as what's happened to Lyft,'' Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives said. Shares of Uber's biggest competitor tumbled to a record low on Wednesday after it disclosed a steep loss in its first quarterly earnings report as a public company. The stock closed 26 per cent below the IPO price of $US72, valuing Lyft at just $US15.1 billion -- exactly the valuation it garnered in its last private funding round in 2018. However, because Lyft is focused on the domestic ride-sharing market, Ives said the company is a "one-trick pony" compared to Uber, a "three-headed value monster." That's certainly how the company's executives and their advisers have been pitching Uber to potential investors in cities including New York, London and San Francisco. On the roadshow, Uber touted its plans to expand in logistics and other transportation businesses, including scooters, autonomous driving and mass transit, a person familiar with the matter has said. The company aims to become a one-stop shop for customers who would only need to use one platform for multiple services.

Arun Sundararajan, a professor at New York University's business school, said that while going public will give Uber money to capture more of the transportation market, it could also push it to put quarterly targets ahead of its broader ambitions. "The trillion dollar valuation will come if they can spend the next five to 10 years getting to that place where more is spent on Uber than on any other form of transportation," Sundararajan said. "The trouble is that's going to require keeping investors at bay who are putting pressure on Uber to deliver earnings." "The freedom to play the long game gets significantly reduced when you go public even when the resources to do so are increased," he said. Like many of the IPO class of 2019, Uber is deeply unprofitable. It lost $US3.04 billion last year on an operating basis on revenue of $US11.3 billion, bringing total operating losses over the past three years to more than $US10 billion, according to filings.

Uber has been working with Morgan Stanley to lead its IPO plans, alongside Goldman Sachs -- once the company's go-to bank -- and Bank of America. Its shares are set to trade on the New York Stock Exchange under the ticker UBER. Uber has long been Silicon Valley's wunderkind, with a cavalcade of elite venture investors betting on the ride-hailing business from the start. Blue-chip investors First Round Capital and then Benchmark led the earliest rounds, cutting checks to the startup that could soon prove to be extremely lucrative investments. Over multiple funding rounds its valuation soared: from $US60 million, to $US3.7 billion, to $US42.8 billion, to -- in 2016 -- $US62.5 billion when Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund wrote the company a $US3.5 billion check, sent in a single wire transfer. But while Uber was coming of age as a Silicon Valley success story, behind the scenes it was struggling to grow up. Co-founder Travis Kalanick resigned in 2017 when early investors pushed for his ouster, after a series of controversies including allegations of sexual harassment inside his company and the use of software to bypass regulators.

Kalanick had long refused to hire an experienced chief financial officer or chief operating officer, both seen as key steps to moving the company toward the public markets. Neither Kalanick nor his co-founder Garrett Camp will be invited to Friday's bell ringing ceremony at the New York Stock Exchange, a person familiar with the matter said, though both are set to be multi-billionaires after the offering. Uber co-founder Travis Kalanick won't be on the NYSE floor to ring the opening bell. Instead, standing centre stage will be Chief Executive Officer Dara Khosrowshahi, who joined Uber from Expedia Group with the express mandate to take the company public. His compensation post-IPO will reward him handsomely if he brings Uber's public valuation to $US120 billion over a 90-day span. Uber's offering is set to be among the 10 largest US IPOs of all time and the biggest on a US exchange since Alibaba Group's $US25 billion global record holder in 2014, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. </s> Uber to give its market value a lift in stock market debut

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Uber's next stop is the stock market, where it hopes to pick up more investors willing to bet on a ride-hailing market brimming with potential and conspicuously lacking in profits.

The world's largest ride-hailing service reached a major milestone Thursday when Uber priced its long-awaited initial public offering at $45 price per share to set the stage for its stock to begin trading Friday morning.

The IPO came in at the lower end of Uber's targeted price range of $44 to $50 per share. The caution may have been driven by escalating doubts about the ability of ride-hailing services to make money since Uber's main rival, Lyft, went public six weeks ago.

Even at the tamped-down price, Uber now has a market value of $82 billion — five times more than Lyft's.

No matter how Uber's stock swings Friday, the IPO has to be considered a triumph for the company most closely associated with an industry that has changed the way millions of people get around. That while also transforming the way millions of more people earn a living in the gig economy.

The IPO raised another $8.1 billion for Uber as it tries to fend off Lyft in the U.S. and help cover the cost of giving rides to passengers at unprofitable prices. The San Francisco company already has lost about $9 billion since its inception and acknowledges it could still be years before it turns a profit.

That sobering reality is one reason that Uber fell well short of reaching the $120 billion market value that many observers believed its IPO might attain.

Another factor working against Uber is the cold shoulder investors have been giving Lyft's stock after an initial run-up. Lyft's shares closed Thursday 23% below its April IPO price of $72.

Uber "clearly learned from its 'little brother' Lyft, and the experience it has gone through," Wedbush Securities analysts Ygal Arounian and Daniel Ives wrote late Thursday.

The jitters about an intensifying U.S. trade war with China also have roiled the stock market this week.

Despite all that, Uber's IPO is the biggest since Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group debuted with a value of $167.6 billion in 2014.

"For the market to give you the value, you've either got to have a lot of profits or potential for huge growth," said Sam Abuelsamid, principal analyst at Navigant Research.

Uber boasts growth galore. Its revenue last year surged 42% to $11.3 billion while its cars completed 5.2 billion trips around the world either giving rides to 91 million passengers or delivering food.

Uber might be even more popular if not for a series of revelations about unsavory behavior that sullied its image and resulted in the ouster of its co-founder, Travis Kalanick, as CEO nearly two years ago.

The self-inflicted wounds included complaints about rampant internal sexual harassment , accusations that it stole self-driving car technology , and a cover-up of a computer break-in that stole personal information about its passengers. What's more, some Uber drivers have been accused of assaulting passengers, and one of its self-driving test vehicles struck and killed a pedestrian in Arizona last year while a backup driver was behind the wheel.

Uber hired Dara Khosrowshahi as CEO to replace Kalanick and clean up the mess, something that analysts say has been able to do to some extent, although Lyft seized upon the scandals to gain market share.

Kalanick remains on Uber's board, although he isn't expected to be on the podium to help ring the opening bell at the New York Stock Exchange to herald the company's debut Friday. Instead, he will be left standing on the sidelines while the spotlight shines on other Uber executives, although Kalanick can still savor his newfound wealth. At $45 per share, his stake in Uber will be worth $5.3 billion. Hundreds, if not thousands, of other Uber employees are expected to become millionaires in the IPO.

Meanwhile, scores of Uber drivers say they have been mistreated by the company as they work long hours and wear out their cars picking up passengers as they struggle to make ends meet. On Wednesday, some of them participated in strikes across the United States to highlight their unhappiness ahead of Uber's IPO but barely caused a ripple. A similar strike was organized ahead of Lyft's IPO to the same effect.

In its latest attempt to make amends, Uber disclosed Thursday that it reached a settlement with tens of thousands of drivers who alleged they had been improperly classified as contractors. The company said the settlement covering most of the 60,000 drivers making claims will cost $146 million to $170 million.

Now, Uber will focus on winning over Wall Street.

Uber may be able to avoid Lyft's post-IPO stock decline because it has a different story to tell than just the potential for growth in ride-hailing, says Alejandro Ortiz, principal analyst with SharesPost. Uber, he said, has plans to be more than a ride-hailing company by being all things transportation to users of its app, offering deliveries, scooters, bicycles and links to other modes of transportation including public mass transit systems.

"Whether or not that pitch will work kind of remains to be seen. It's nearly impossible to tell now," he said. "Obviously the risk to the company now is they have a lot more shareholders that they have to convince." </s> NEW YORK: Uber geared up on Thursday (May 9) for its Wall Street debut with a massive share offering that is a milestone for the ride-hailing industry and the so-called "sharing economy," but which comes amid simmering concerns about its business model.

Shares will be priced at US$45 for the initial public offering (IPO) on Friday, valuing the startup at more than US$82 billion, according to filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

San Francisco-based Uber was set to begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange under the eponymous ticker "UBER" in one of the largest initial public offerings in the tech sector.

Despite the eye-popping valuation, Uber dialed back some of its earlier ambitions for a value over US$100 billion after a rocky start for US rideshare rival Lyft.

Analyst Daniel Ives of Wedbush Securities said Uber has the potential to be a game-changing company and "is paving a similar road to what Amazon did to transform retail/ecommerce and Facebook did for social media."

Ives said Uber has the potential to grow as it morphs its ridesharing platform into a more diverse set of services with Uber Eats, Uber Freight, and self-driving vehicle initiatives.

"We view Uber's conservative pricing as a smart and prudent strategy coming out of the box as it clearly learned from its 'little brother' Lyft, and the experience it has gone through over the past month," Ives said in a note to investors.

But some of the risks surrounding Uber and its rivals were highlighted on Wednesday as thousands of drivers turned off their apps in a US-wide strike over pay and working conditions.

The strikes targeting Uber and its US rival Lyft highlighted a dilemma for rideshare firms, which have faced challenges from regulators and traditional taxi operators for using a business model relying on independent contractors.

One group protested outside the New York Stock Exchange with some signs reading "Invest in our lives - Not their stocks."

Uber and Lyft did not immediately comment on the protests.

"While we aim to provide an earnings opportunity comparable to that available in retail, wholesale, or restaurant services or other similar work, we continue to experience dissatisfaction with our platform from a significant number of drivers," Uber said in a filing with securities regulators.

"In particular, as we aim to reduce driver incentives to improve our financial performance, we expect driver dissatisfaction will generally increase."

Rideshare companies maintain that drivers are able to thrive and maintain work flexibility, and that their business model would not work if drivers were treated as wage-based employees.

Uber said in a securities filing ahead of the IPO that it had set aside US$132 million to settle claims from drivers but maintained it was sticking to its plans on how it classifies drivers.

"Our business would be adversely affected if drivers were classified as employees instead of independent contractors," the company said.

Global Equities Research analyst Trip Chowdhry predicted that Uber will eventually have to raise ride prices, causing its customers to seek other options.

Uber will be raising up to US$9 billion in the offering being underwritten by Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley and Bank of America Merrill Lynch and other large banks.

Uber's inauguration as a public company will follow a rocky market debut for Lyft, which has lost more than 15 per cent of its value since its March offering.

Lyft's losses in the past quarter widened to US$1.1 billion, according to its first financial report as a public company.

Revenue for California-based Lyft nearly doubled from a year earlier to US$776 million and the number of active riders grew to over 20.5 million.

Lyft said its losses deepened as a result of US$894 million in costs that included stock-based compensation and related tax expenses in connection with its IPO.

Uber envisions becoming the "Amazon of transportation" in a future where people share instead of owning vehicles.

If all goes to plan, commuters could ride an e-scooter to a transit station, take a train, then grab an e-bike or e-scooter to complete a journey using the Uber smartphone app.

Of course, shared car rides would be an option, eventually driven by computers instead of humans.

Uber is also taking to the sky with an Elevate project to have electric aircraft carry people between "skyports," taking off and landing vertically.

Uber's platform moves cargo as well as people, with a Freight service that connects truckers with shippers in a way similar to how drivers connect with people seeking rides.

Uber is also seeing growing success with an Eats service that pays drivers to deliver meals ordered from restaurants. </s> The San Francisco–based ride-hailing company started trading on the New York Stock Exchange on Friday at $42, below the $45 IPO price that had put Uber’s value above $80 billion. Shortly after opening, Uber's market cap fell to roughly $72 billion.

While Uber remains one of the largest IPOs in history, it is still not what the company hoped for. Uber told investors as recently as last month it could be valued as high as $100 billion. And its last private funding round valued the company at $76 billion.



The IPO caps a turbulent period for Uber. Its founder and CEO, Travis Kalanick, stepped down in June 2017 amid chaos after a former employee exposed its toxic work culture and further reports showed it played fast and loose with the law. The episodes tested how far a CEO could push the Silicon Valley ethos that values skirting the rules in order to grow. Ultimately, Kalanick pushed too hard and gave way to Dara Khosrowshahi. The company’s new, soft-spoken CEO, who previously ran Expedia, has stabilized the company enough to bring it to the public markets, although issues with drivers remain unresolved, with many protesting around the world for fair pay earlier this week.

Brendan Sexton, executive director of the Independent Drivers Guild, said in a statement, "As Uber’s wealthy investors get wealthier today, remember that most of the drivers who built the company are still making poverty wages, often far less than minimum wage.”

With the IPO out of the way, Uber’s biggest challenges lie ahead. The company lost $1.8 billion in 2018, and many doubt its business model can work as long as it relies on human drivers. A driverless future, meanwhile, seems further off than initially anticipated.

Underlining the challenges ahead, Uber’s main competitor, Lyft, lost $1.14 billion in the first quarter of this year alone. Lyft is trading well below its opening price of $72, currently at approximately $55. Uber hopes to avoid a similar fate.
Uber makes its initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange, starting by selling stocks at $42 and closing at $41.60. Uber's market cap drops from over $80 billion to about $72 billion.