The Robotaxi Trade Everyone Is Getting Wrong

LGD (0:00)

When is the last time that you took an Uber? For most of you, it was probably today, and that Uber probably had a human driver. But there's a very near future where there are no drivers and the vehicles drive themselves. This is a huge market that's coming in the next few years. And many out there think that Elon Musk and Tesla are set to absolutely dominate it as they lead us into FSD.

But Uber will not go that quietly. In fact, they're doing everything they can to remain kings of the taxi business. What's up, everybody? It's LGD who's set here and welcome to Milk Road Stocks, the daily market show that lives too far away to get any kind of autonomous ride. And at this point, I might just buy a horse. Today is September 11th, 2026, recording on the 9th. Every week, I sit down with our lead researcher and analyst Martin to dive deep into a stock and company and understand why he does or does not hold it in his portfolio. And today he's walking through a very contentious race happening between two very big companies, Tesla and Uber. There are so many aspects of this conversation that I actually never thought of. Like, where will all these AVs park? How many jurisdictions will ever actually approve this to happen? And how are both companies leveraging all their data to actually build this future? We're going to cover all of that and more in today's show. And if you want to see how Martin is expressing this trade, you can see the dozen or so assets he holds in Milk Road PRO, which costs just a dollar for a seven day trial at the link below. What's up, Martin? Listen, we're going to learn about cyber cabs today, robo-taxis and I'm going to tell you right now that I'm really excited for this because I live in a very rural community and when we had our Milk Road retreat a few weeks ago was the first time I'd taken an Uber in months because there is no Uber where I live. And I would love something to come and get me and take me places sometimes, but it just doesn't exist. The taxi is super unreliable here. It's some random guy calling the phone. So please tell me about how these companies are going to race each other to a world where even people like me can have an option.

I'm very keen to learn about this race that I think a lot of people aren't paying attention to right now.

Martin (1:55)

Yeah. I actually think that the whole total other civil market is going to grow dramatically over the coming years because of the autonomy. And I think both of these companies are going to benefit a lot from this transition into AVs and robotaxis from human driving cars. So I think this market is going to explode pretty soon.

LGD (2:19)

Excellent. Well, that sounds exciting. And I think Uber, at least from the retail perspective, I feel like people aren't really sure where Uber stands in this, even though they probably follow Tesla and CyberCabs a lot more, or even Waymo's or whatever. I feel like Uber is the lesser known company, but we're going to learn about both companies' positionings today.

Martin (2:37)

Yeah, I want to say that I hold both companies because I'm bullish on both of them. And so from my point of view, I think they can both succeed in this new world that we are heading into. And today, I want to share my presentation why I think that's the case. Because right now, everyone thinks that Tesla removes drivers, they have the cheapest car possible in the world, and everyone else is going to die, basically.

They are going to replace Uber and everyone else, so it's going to be Tesla's work from now on. And my point is that I don't think that's the case, because Tesla might be good in some layers. Here, I have the full mobility stack, so you see it's not just about the car or the software, it's also about the operations, regulations, you need to find demand, you need to process the payments. And it's a lot of other stuff that Tesla needs to do. And today I want to show you and walk you through each of these layers and say where Tesla might have some advantages, is it going to last or not, and how Uber fits into these layers as well. So I think Tesla can be vertical stack, very successful in their business with their robot taxis. But at the same time, Uber can do really well because they will just aggregate every other AV manufacturer in the world because they have the demand. They are entering this market from a different entry zone.