Uber raises $8.1 billion in IPO priced near bottom of range

Uber Technologies Inc. raised $8.1 billion in its initial public offering after pricing shares near the bottom of their marketed range.

The ride-hailing giant sold 180 million shares for $45 each, according to a statement Thursday. It had marketed them for $44 to $50 apiece.

Based on the amount of stock outstanding after the offering, the IPO price gives San Francisco-based Uber a market value of $75.5 billion, just below its last private market value of $76 billion. The fully diluted value, including restricted stock units and other shares, could be about $82 billion.

Uber has prioritized selecting shareholders — particularly institutional investors — that it thinks will hold on to the stock for a long time, according to a person familiar with the matter. The company is hoping to avoid the tumultuous first weeks of trading in rival Lyft Inc., whose shares fell below its $72 IPO price within days of listing and closed 23% below that price Thursday.

“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,� Wedbush Securities analyst Dan Ives said. Uber’s biggest competitor briefly dipped below its last private value of $15.1 billion in premarket trading Thursday, before rebounding to close at $55.18 for a valuation of about $15.8 billion.

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Top 10

Even at the low end of the price range, Uber’s listing is set to be among the 10 largest U.S. IPOs 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.

Still, it’s 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.

That’s partly because, after waiting a decade to go public, the most highly valued start-up in the United States is set to make its market debut amid less-than-ideal conditions. U.S. stocks fell for a fourth day Thursday, leaving the S&P 500 index on pace for its worst week of the year as trade tensions escalated between the U.S. and China. Uber shares are due to begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange on Friday under the ticker UBER.

This year, widely expected to be the busiest for mega U.S. tech listings this century, started with a partial government shutdown that shut 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 Lyft and a host of other hopefuls — was left sitting on the sidelines while U.S. stocks enjoyed the best start to a year in at least a decade.

Uber’s IPO pricing — and subsequent trading performance — will be closely watched by the cavalcade of other tech start-ups that are expected to go public this year, including Slack Technologies Inc., Postmates Inc., Peloton Interactive Inc. and Airbnb Inc.

Final price

Uber’s executives and advisors settled on a final IPO price after spending the last couple of weeks pitching to potential investors at roadshow events in New York, London, San Francisco and other cities. Picking the right number helps ensure that the stock has a stable start to trading: The price goes up, but not so much that investors worry that more money should have been raised.

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.

Operating losses

Like many other members of the IPO class of 2019, Uber is deeply unprofitable. It lost $3.04 billion last year on an operating basis on revenue of $11.3 billion, bringing total operating losses over the last three years to more than $10 billion, according to filings.

Uber has been working with Morgan Stanley to lead its IPO plans, alongside Goldman Sachs Group Inc. — which was once the company’s go-to bank — and Bank of America Corp. as part of a roster of 29 banks in total that were listed in its prospectus as advising on the offering.