Lyft, Inc. (NASDAQ:LYFT) Q4 2022 Earnings Call Transcript

Alex Potter: Great, thanks. So you mentioned this is following up there on Lyft Pink. You were mentioning earlier that it’s a great value. You pay $9.99, but you get $29 in value. How do you assess the economic impact then to Lyft? At the, in the early stages of a membership, I guess, lifecycle, presumably the economics aren’t quite as favorable for you. How do you sort of calculate how long it takes to earn back what you’re presumably giving away at the outset?

John Zimmer: So just to be clear that the $29 doesn’t mean that we’re, the individuals paying $9.99 and we’re — we have costs of $29. It means that the value they get from the program on things that we may have a large margin on is $29. We are running the program profitably. We look at two main metrics for Lyft Pink. One is incrementality when a person has Lyft Pink verse doesn’t. They ride more with Lyft, and every ride more they take with us is incremental profit for us. And we look at retention on a month over month basis, and we’re seeing industry level retention for these types of membership programs. So, again, we are running the program profitably, and still users are able to get that type of value.

Alex Potter: Okay, great. And then one last one here on just on stock-based comp. You mentioned that 2024 target, which is helpful. Thanks very much for that. I’m curious to hear how you’re getting to that. Are you focusing on attrition? Are you just talking about SPC being a lower percentage of people’s comp in general? What’s your strategy for driving that lower? Thanks.

John Zimmer: Yes, there’s two main things. One is that we did the reduction enforce last year, late last year. So that’s accounted for in that new target. And also there’s been a shift on some of our talent to international markets where your second point is more the case that individuals are primarily making cash, not equity.

Operator: Your next question comes from the line of John with Jefferies.

Unidentified Analyst : Hey, thanks for taking my questions. I just wanted to start with the first quarter guidance assumes that you’re going to need to see a ramp and incremental margin to get towards the $1,024 million EBITDA. Can you just walk, talk about how you can balance your competitive positioning and EBITDA margin over time and if there’s anything about the first quarter that’s causing sort of transitory headwinds to profitability. And also want to ask quickly going back to sort of regulation, I believe in New York City, there is a proposed rideshare wage increase that recently announced. Maybe you could just talk about how are you thinking about that and if you believe you can sort of just price that through. Thanks.

John Zimmer: Yes, so I think, the most kind of important piece to understand as what we talked about before which is the timing of entrance renewal. And the significance that has had on our Q1 margin. I think if you look back at our earlier margins, Q2, Q3 last year that’s probably more instructive of a typical place for them to operate. But the market place dynamics have changed, the competitive environment is different and so we are stepping back and reassessing at this moment. On New York, you had ask about kind of the potential for pricing change, we are not party in that litigation that’s ongoing. If there is any pricing change it would at the industry level and so would be pass through.

Operator: Your next question comes from the line of Steven Fox with Fox Advisors.