San Francisco-based Uber dips below $45 per share IPO price as trading starts

ByCATHY BUSSEWITZ, MICHAEL LIEDTKE and TOM KRISHER AP logo
Friday, May 10, 2019
SF-based Uber goes public, prices IPO at $45 a share
San Francisco-based Uber has officially gone public.

SAN FRANCISCO -- Uber's IPO is now one of America's largest on record.

The ride-hailing company's shares dropped from it's initial public offering price of $45 to $42 when it opened for trading.

However, the IPO still created some instant millionaires.

"Our compensation just keeps getting smaller and smaller," Ademar Filho, an Uber driver, said. "We have to work more and more for less."

Filho is just one of many frustrated Uber drivers around the world. Strikes were held this week attempting to call out the San Francisco-based company on pay cuts and working conditions.

"I hope," Mario Hernandez, an Uber driver, said. "I hope they're going to do something about it."

Ahead of the multibillion-dollar IPO, Uber played up its plans to expand in other transit businesses like scooters and autonomous vehicles.

"I don't think that's going to happen any time soon," Filho said. "I am very familiar that they are trying to become profitable, Uber, but if they want to become profitable, the message is very simple. Raise the fares a little bit."

Filho's passenger visiting San Francisco from Indianapolis agreed. "I'm for people earning a good living and making good money for things that they do," he said. "But, when it's billions I mean really, how to spend the second $800,000 or $8 million?"

There are doubts Uber will have the ability to turn a profit, especially when you look at its rival that went public in March. Lyft shares dipped to a record low earlier this week.

However, Quentin Hardy, editorial director for Google Cloud, said companies in the past have bounced back.

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