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Comment by zaroth | Hacker News Reader

> Uber said it expects an impairment charge of up to $2.2 billion in the first quarter due to the outbreak and for revenue to nosedive by $17 million to $22 million in the quarter.

The impairment charge is on the “reduced value of equity investments”. Not sure what that’s about.

But “revenue to nosedive $22 million...” this makes no sense. Last year Uber reported a net loss of $8.51 billion.

I think $22 million is the cost of programs it has put in place to help drivers during the pandemic. In other words, a pittance.

Last report was that Uber traffic had cratered 60-70% in Seattle as of March 19th. I can only imagine the world of hurt Uber is in for based on a global 60-70% revenue drop in the face of their fixed costs. $22 million ain’t it.

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Indeed. In 2019 they had GAAP revenue of $14 billion (and GAAP net loss of $8.5 billion). The article is clearly wrong, their quarterly revenue is way above $39 million - they haven’t reported Q1 2020 earnings yet, but revenue will be in the billions.

Regardless, layoffs are necessary. Even before COVID, Uber was burning money at an absolutely insane rate, and really don’t have much runway for a public company. Obviously COVID makes the situation much worse. Heavy layoffs suck for everyone who loses their job, but they are necessary here.

This was sloppy reporting/writing. The "revenue to nosedive by $17 million to $22 million" was the specific effect only attributable to their Covid-19 financial assistance program. Here's the quote directly from Uber's release:

"To support those whose earning opportunities have been depressed as a result of COVID-19, as well as communities hit hard by the virus, we announced and implemented several initiatives during the first quarter of 2020, including a financial assistance program for drivers and delivery people. We intend to account for this program as Contra Revenue, which we expect will reduce GAAP Revenue by an estimated $17 to $22 million in Q1 and an estimated $60 to $80 million in Q2."

https://investor.uber.com/news-events/news/press-release-det...

Uber's q4 2019 revenue was 4B $.

A drop of 20 million (ignoring the fact that quarterly results look at YoY, as opposed to quarter to quarter) from expectations would be... quite impressive? ( quite in contrast to other reports of a 80% drop in volume of rides.)

I think what might be interesting to watch is their forecasts for next quarter, as well as for the year.

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