Lyft shares surge 60% after typo in Earnings Report

Last week, a typo error in the earnings report of the ride-sharing platform Lyft led to a significant surge in their stock price before the company promptly corrected the mistake.

Lyft had initially announced what seemed to be an incredible opportunity for investors: they anticipated a 5-percentage-point increase in their profit margins—or 500 basis points, as specified in the release.

Following the report, the ride-hailing company stocks which had closed at $12.12 per share spiked to $20.04. According to Bloomberg, 45 million shares were traded after the initial earnings release, which is about three times as many shares as Lyft usually trades in a day.

After noticing the error, Lyft’s Chief Executive Officer David Risher was quick to rectify it noting that the margin is forecasted to expand by 50 points, or 0.5%.

“It was a bad error, and that’s on me,” Lyft’s Chief Executive Officer David Risher later side when he appeared on CNBC.

The stock has since fallen to just over $14 a share representing about a $2 increase from its closing price.

Lyft is yet to reach profitability even as it continues to battle issues of driver strikes. In their last quarter, the company reported a $26.3 million loss which is actually a major improvement from the $588 million it had in net losses in the fourth quarter of 2022.

Lyft also reduced net losses to $340.3 million in 2023 compared to $1.6 billion in 2022.

However, Lyft anticipates 2024 to be the year that they break free. Their biggest competitor, Uber, announced last week that it had turned a profit last year for the first time since going public.