[aetherson]

This is probably basically about the fact that driver portion is more complicated in UberPool than in the rest of their services.

It's to Uber's credit that on an ordinary ride, they don't try to claim that they have revenue equal to the entire fare. That would be an easy way for them to make their top-line financials look way more palatable than they actually are (ie, that they lost about $3B on $20B, rather than $3B on $7B).

But it may be genuinely hard to report on just the share of UberPool revenue that does not go to the driver, as my understanding is that the calculation is much more complicated in that case.

[nebabyte]

Uh, that seems like something they'd get called out on pretty quickly if they tried, and would make them look worse off with the actual number than if they just opened with it

Uber's gotten away with a lot of stuff but I doubt even they could pull a 'whoops, forgot our expenses' sleight of hand. Especially since they try and frame drivers as 'contractors' and not employees

[aetherson]

Revenue, not profit. They wouldn't be saying that they forgot about expenses, just that their expenses come out of $20B in revenue, not $7B in revenue.

[pfarnsworth]

Probably not to their credit, it's something their auditors wouldn't accept because it's fairly straightforward accounting.

[aetherson]

These aren't security filings or for their investors. It's to the press. Nobody external is forcing them to account for anything in any particular way that's not blatantly fraudulent.