Uber's 4Q loss narrows, raising hopes for pandemic recovery

SAN RAMON, Calif. (AP) — Uber’s whittled its losses at the end of a topsy-turvy year that forced the ride-hailing service to rely more heavily on its food-delivery business after the pandemic dramatically reduced the number of people willing to hop into a car driven by a stranger.

The fourth-quarter results announced Wednesday drew a picture of a company making strides in its attempt to recover from a staggering blow delivered last March, when efforts to contain the novel coronavirus shut down much of the economy and upended its ride-hailing service.

The upheaval accelerated Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi’s plans to expand the company’s food-delivery operation as part of an effort to build a more versatile transportation service. Those efforts, which included a $2.65 billion acquisition of Postmates last year, have enabled the food-delivery service to bring in nearly as much revenue Uber's ride-hailing business.

Uber is poised to expand even further beyond transporting people with its recent $1.1 billion deal for alcohol delivery service Drizly.

But analysts believe Uber’s pioneering ride-hailing service will also eventually bounce back as more people are vaccinated against COVID-19. Those predictions, coupled with the success of the food-delivery expansion, is the main reason Uber’s stock price has recently been hovering at its all-time high, more than quadrupling from its lows reached nearly 11 months ago during the early stages of the pandemic.

Uber’s shares dipped by about 3% in Wednesday's extended trading after the quarterly numbers came out. The decline may have reflected mild disappointment with quarterly revenue that fell slightly below the estimates of analysts polled by FactSet.

“We’re cautiously optimistic that this progress will continue and, in fact, accelerate over the next quarters,"...