Chit Chat Stocks Podcast Episode Summary

Episode: Uber Stock: Why This Investor Thinks There Is Still Massive Upside From Here (Ticker: UBER)
Date: January 21, 2026
Hosts: Ryan Henderson & Brett Schafer
Guest: Arya Radnia

Overview

This episode centers on Uber Technologies (UBER), exploring why recurring guest and investor Arya Radnia (fiscal AI, YouTube, Twitter) remains bullish on the stock’s upside. The discussion canvasses Uber’s business segments, global footprint, the impact and risks of autonomous vehicles (AVs), growth in delivery, burgeoning advertising opportunity, strategic “moonshots,” and the bear case. Throughout, Arya shares what he believes the market misunderstands about Uber and reflects on valuation and risk factors.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Business Breakdown and Current Growth Drivers

[02:24] Arya Radnia:

• Uber’s three main segments:
  • Mobility (rides): ~60% of revenue
  • Delivery (Uber Eats): ~35% of revenue
  • Freight: 5–10% of revenue
• Core business growing north of 20%; headline revenue ~18% because of slower freight
• Uber is in 70 countries, 9M drivers, 200M monthly active users

2. Geographic Diversification and Opportunity

[03:53] Arya Radnia:

• 50% of revenues from North America, ~30% from Europe/Middle East/Africa.
• Significant runway even in “mature” markets:
  • US: Not the most penetrated market, e.g., in Germany only 1 in 100 adults uses Uber monthly.
  • Australia, Canada: Higher user penetration.
• Massive white space in both “mature” and emerging markets; growth can come from new users and from increasing frequency of use.
• [06:19] The average user transacts 6x/month; median is 2x, indicating lots of room to grow.

Quote:
"There’s still massive GDP countries... even in their mature countries there’s a lot of white space to continue their growth." — Arya, [06:19]

3. Autonomous Vehicles (AVs): Threat or Tailwind?

[08:15] Arya Radnia:

• Arya believes AVs are a secular tailwind for Uber.
• Market often wrongly assumes Waymo/Tesla or others could instantly displace Uber's network.
• First principles: Uber’s global user base, driver network, and local market penetration are massive moats not easily rebuilt.
• Critical Challenge for AVs:
  • Ridesharing demand is highly variable (“sinusoidal” by hour/day).
  • Fixed supply of AVs can’t efficiently handle surges/troughs in demand:
    • Uber can hybridize human drivers + AVs for flexible supply and maximize utilization.

Quote:
"It’s very easy and frankly lazy to say, ‘Waymo’s going to come along… and Uber goes to zero.’ You gotta look at it on a deeper level." — Arya, [08:15]

• Technological and Geographic Barriers:

  • Only Waymo has achieved serious Level 4 autonomy, and then only in controlled conditions; harsh weather, poor infrastructure, or international contexts are huge challenges ([13:23]).
  • AV companies face cleaning, charging, lost items, and other operational headaches Uber has solved over 15 years.

• Platform Moat:

  • Uber's app saves data, user preferences, payment details—creating switching costs.
  • Even if AV providers could build their own app, users have little incentive to switch.

3.1. Incentives for AV Partnerships

[16:30] Co-host:

• AV companies desire full car utilization for ROI.
• Even industry leaders (Waymo, backed by Google) partner with Uber for access to users and to maximize utilization.
• For smaller AV companies with no “Google Maps” scale, Uber is the logical aggregator/distributor.

Quote:
"If you don’t use Uber... it’s harder to meet full utilization. And I think Waymo’s seen that. That’s why they’ve partnered with Uber in so many markets." — Co-host, [16:30]

3.2. Bear Case Around AVs & Potential Drawback to Partnerships

[18:37] Arya Radnia:

• Disadvantage for Waymo et al: Don’t “own” the customer relationship, Uber could raise take rates, the AV provider is then reliant. But benefits (utilization, revenue) outweigh the risks, similar to hotel rooms appearing on OTAs despite take rates.

3.3. Extreme Bear Scenario—Waymo “Goes to War”

[24:15] Brett Shafer:

• If Waymo/Alphabet directly capture customers via Google Maps, bypass Uber?
  • Arya: Still faces the “demand oscillation” dilemma. Also, Uber could partner with AV competitors (Neuro, PonyAI, Aurora, etc.).

Quote:
"If you want to maximize revenue per car, you have to go through an Uber." — Arya, [23:24]

3.4. Would Arya Want Uber to Build Their Own AVs?

[28:16] Arya Radnia:

• Uber spun out their AV division (Aurora)—not likely to build AVs in-house.
• Future question: Will Uber own AV fleets? If so, would shift company to a more capital-intensive model, but Arya expects REIT-like financialization for fleet assets long-term.

4. Uber Eats & Delivery Business

4.1. Profitability Now and Expansion

[30:17] Arya Radnia:

• Uber Eats is profitable (adj. EBITDA); Freight not profitable but smaller part.
• Delivery profits being reinvested for growth—new opportunities in grocery and retail.
  • Grocery as a $10T TAM; reality is smaller basket frequent-use cases dominate.

4.2. Differentiated Use Case

• Consumers use Eats for “we ran out of pasta sauce” situations, not full Instacart-style hauls.
• Speed & convenience: delivery in 30 minutes can cut into convenience store and even Amazon’s moat in time-sensitive situations ([31:30], [33:36]).
• Eats is a small but fast-growing part of Uber.

4.3. Advertising Opportunity

[34:07] Arya Radnia:

• Uber’s ad business is $1.5B run-rate, grows 60% YoY.
• Highly profitable, possibly one-third of Uber’s operating profit.
• High intent/intensity (user searching directly for ‘pizza’, e.g.), making inventory ultra-valuable for brands.
• Advertising a key part of margin expansion for Uber.

Quote:
"If I’m typing in ‘pizza’ in the Uber Eats app, take a wild guess what I’m looking for... that’s very targeted advertising for Uber." — Arya, [34:07]

4.4. Merchant-Funded Offers—“Genius Move”

[36:19] Arya Radnia:

• Uber let restaurants fund their own special offers (“Buy One Get One Free”) to drive visibility—a win for both merchants (more foot traffic, awareness) and Uber (higher engagement/frequency).

5. Moonshots & Optionality

[37:43] Arya Radnia:

• Uber’s massive optionality: “demand aggregator” for many fragmented markets—rides, delivery, grocery, retail, and beyond (ski resort bookings, Uber Helicopter, package courier, Uber Pet, Uber Health, rental cars via Hertz, etc.)
• Growing into rental cars as an aggregator, not owner of fleets (yet).
• Optionality could see “moonshot” projects become major businesses down the line.
• Uber AI Solutions: gig work for drivers labeling data for LLMs.

6. Investment Portfolio & Strategic Stakes

[42:51] Arya Radnia:

• Uber holds ~$9B in investments across geographies—stakes in local competitors like Grab (SE Asia), Careem (Middle East, now 80%-owned), and AV companies (Aurora, etc.).
  • Often exited costly markets in exchange for equity in dominant player.

7. Market Penetration & Growth Tailwinds

[45:15] Arya Radnia:

• Mobility and Eats ~15% penetration in US—major upside if they reach Amazon’s 25–35% e-commerce penetration.
• Growth via tailwinds: urbanization, convenience, potential AV cost reductions.

Quote:
"Sky’s the limit... we could probably be closing in on 30, 40, maybe 50% [penetration] thereabouts over time." — Arya, [45:15]

8. Take Rate Strategy

[47:30] Arya Radnia:

• Uber has nudged up take rate (from 20% → 30%, now 27%), but CEO Dara is cautious:
  • “Fat pigs get slaughtered”—too high a toll risks opening the door to low-cost rivals.
• Future profit growth to come from usage/frequency, not take rate increases.

9. Valuation & Investment Criteria

[49:18] Arya Radnia:

• Valuation is messy: margins expanding, some accounting/one-off items.
• Best current metric: fwd P/E or trailing price-to-EBT (earnings before tax)—Uber at ~30x, with revenue/EPS growing 20–25% a year.

Quote:
"You're paying 30 times earnings for roughly 20 to 25% EPS growth over the next handful of years." — Arya, [49:18]

• Arya’s sell signals:
  • Valuation gets stretched (>50–60x earnings)
  • Core growth decelerates below 10%
  • Strategic missteps or wasteful capital allocation
  • Something breaks in core business or optionality

10. Biggest Misunderstanding About Uber

[54:01] Arya Radnia:

• Market underestimates how hard Uber’s platform is to replicate—huge network effects, complex logistics, decades of optimization, and operational execution.
• Belief that AVs/apps from tech giants can instantly replace Uber is naive.

Quote:
"There’s just a massive disconnect in terms of how easy it is to replicate the Uber business. If it was so easy, we’d have 100 competitors. There’s a reason there isn’t." — Arya, [54:01]

11. Leadership Matters

[55:21] Arya Radnia:

• CEO Dara Khosrowshahi is key to Arya’s confidence in Uber; would reassess thesis and weighting if he stepped down.

Notable Quotes (with Timestamps)

• "Average Uber user today transacts six times per month. The median is much lower, the median is two times per month... massive amount of white space..." — Arya, [06:19]
• "You don't just spin that up in a weekend... there's a lot of different barriers to entry that Uber has developed over 15 years..." — Arya, [08:15]
• "If you want to maximize revenue per car, you have to go through an Uber." — Arya, [23:24]
• "Uber eats is definitely profitable. It's profitable on a adjusted EBITDA margin... they've proven that this business can be profitable." — Arya, [30:17]
• "The advertising has been a huge reason why the company is profitable... it's a $1.5 billion run rate business... growing 60% year on year." — Arya, [34:07]
• "What really gets me excited... is the sheer amount of optionality this company has. They're essentially a demand aggregator." — Arya, [37:43]
• "You're paying 30 times earnings for roughly 20 to 25% EPS growth over the next handful of years." — Arya, [49:18]
• "There’s just a massive disconnect in terms of how easy it is to replicate the Uber business. If it was so easy, we’d have 100 competitors." — Arya, [54:01]

Timestamps for Key Segments

• [02:24] Business model, revenue split, global scale
• [03:53] Geographic breakdown, international runway
• [08:15] Autonomous vehicles: threat or tailwind?
• [16:30] Why AVs need Uber—utilization and partnerships
• [18:37] The bear case from the AV-provider perspective
• [24:15] "Scorched earth" Waymo scenario
• [30:17] Uber Eats profitability and expansion
• [34:07] Advertising on Uber Eats
• [37:43] Moonshot projects and platform optionality
• [42:51] Strategic investment portfolio
• [45:15] Market penetration and growth ceiling
• [47:30] Take rate management
• [49:18] Valuation approach
• [54:01] Most misunderstood about Uber’s moat
• [55:21] Leadership importance

Closing Thoughts

Arya remains highly confident in Uber’s path, emphasizing the network effect, platform stickiness, and growth in both core and adjacent opportunities. Autonomous vehicles are seen as a complement and scaling challenge for competitors, not a terminal risk. The delivery and advertising businesses add margin and growth. The main risks are capital misallocation or unexpected slowdowns in growth.

Arya:
"Nothing would really make me want to sell, except if growth dropped below 10% or the multiple just got too high." — [51:02]

Hosts:
Ryan and Brett are intrigued, with Brett waiting for a lower entry multiple to get greedy, and Ryan acknowledging Arya’s AV thesis strengthened his sense of Uber’s position.

Where to find Arya Radnia

• YouTube & Twitter: @AryaRadnia
• Deep-dive content with focus on moats, qualitative research, reasonable future projections

Note: This summary omits ads, intros/outros, and focuses strictly on actionable podcast content.