Lyft says he had the best week for travel since the pandemic blockades began

Lyft is seeing a recovery in hitchhiking earlier than he expected.

In a filing with the SEC on Tuesday, the company said that improving trends will allow it to reduce losses in the current quarter by more than expected.

Lyft now expects to manage his first-quarter adjusted EBITDA loss to $ 135 million, from the previously forecasted $ 145 million to $ 150 million.

The revised forecast comes at the back of an increase in travel sharing. The company said in the document that the last week of February was its best week in terms of volume since the pandemic blockades began in March 2020.

Lyft’s share jumped about 8% after hours after the company’s announcement.

In addition, Lyft expects the recovery to continue this month and show positive growth year-on-year in the volume of shared travel in the second half of March.

Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi told Morgan Stanley’s technology conference on Monday that he expects his mobility business to see some signs of recovery in the U.S. and Europe, but warned that it is “too early to say”.

Even as travel-sharing volumes plummeted in the midst of the pandemic, Uber and Lyft, the two main participants in travel-sharing in the United States, pledged to become profitable by the end of 2021 based on adjusted EBITDA.

But while the two companies have cut costs aggressively in the past year, their strategies have been different.

Uber split its less profitable businesses and placed large bets on the food delivery space in an effort to replenish lost revenue from sharing rides. Lyft kept his focus on travel sharing and looked at the reopening of the economy in general. At the end of last year, she said she was exploring a delivery service, but aimed at companies.

Both companies’ shares rebounded from last year’s lows, with Uber rising more than 60% in the last 12 months and Lyft 50%.