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Uber faces a speed bump as key investor Goldman Sachs sells its shares

TThe year has witnessed a rocky start for Uber as Goldman Sachs decided to sell their holdings in the company in the past few
The year has witnessed a rocky start for Uber as Goldman Sachs decided to sell their holdings in the company in the past few months of 2019.

Uber is one of the best on-order ride services that are available in different countries, offering a wide range of services from one single platform. However, the year has witnessed a rocky start for the company as it’s vital investor, Goldman Sachs decided to sell their holdings in the company in the past few months of 2019.

The investment bank was disappointed to see Uber’s performance in the stock market, and they decided to sell the shares they had to cut down the losses. This was made official by Goldman Sachs CFO Stephen Scherr, who said that they had closed their position in Uber in the last quarter of 2019. The bank is also planning to reduce its exposure in the investments, which were close to $2.4 billion by the end of 2019.

As soon as the lock-in period ended, in November 2019, Goldman Sachs decided to sell the 10 million share it had in Uber in two months as Uber faced a significant low in share prices in the third quarter. Uber lost around $1.16 billion in the third quarter last year, but the company’s revenue improved by 30%, making it $3.81 billion.

The bad ride for Uber

In 2019, Uber decided to go public with its IPO, but the first-day prices were $41.57 a piece, which was 7.6% lower than the $45 per share IPO price. The IPO helped them gain $8.1 billion on the first day, and the current trading price is $35.01 (at the time of publication). In July 2019, Uber was forced to downsize the marketing department in 75 places across the globe.

Before announcing its quarterly report in 2019, Uber downsized by laying off 400 employees from its workforce of 1200. Along with this, in June, the COO of the company, Barney Harford, and the chief marketing officer Rebecca Messina decided to step down from their position.

The layoffs took place after Uber lost over $1 billion in the first quarter of 2019, and these were carried out to streamline the operations and to cut down the spending on human resources.

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