What Is the Postmates IPO Date?

CEO Bastian Lehmann could set the Postmates IPO date for some time in 2019, but anxious investors want to get their hands on Postmates stock now.  

The stock price for Postmates' competitor, GrubHub Inc. (NYSE: GRUB), has skyrocketed 72.59% so far in 2017.

Postmates IPO date

You see, the U.S. food home-delivery market is red hot right now. The market is expected to climb from $43 billion in 2017 to $76 billion by 2022, according to investment firm Cowen.

In just five years, that's an increase of 76.74%.

But investors are torn on whether to invest in GRUB in 2017, or hold out for Postmates to go public in 2019.

Today, we wanted to make sure Money Morning readers know the difference between the two services.

Also, we're going to provide you with a third option on how to play the U.S. food home-delivery business that may surprise you...

Ahead of the Postmates IPO Date, Here's What You Need to Know

Both GrubHub and Postmates have mobile apps for smartphones that allow customers to place orders.

Postmates, though, also delivers alcohol. You must be at least 21 years old to receive alcohol, and an account owner has to be present to accept the delivery.

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Postmates is a private company, so it hasn't released financial data on how much it's made through alcohol sales.

But the company's goal is to make $10 million through alcohol deliveries in Los Angeles and San Francisco in 2017, according to Recode. Lehmann said in January 2017 that the "time is right to really take new categories seriously," according to the aforementioned Recode report.

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As Postmates gets closer to an IPO, we're going to update Money Morning readers through our free IPO Profit Alerts service. Through Profit Alerts, you'll receive real-time recommendations about IPOs directly to your inbox.

But until the Postmates IPO, there's actually a third option for investing in the $43 billion U.S. food-delivery business that may surprise you.

And with this option, you won't have to wait...

Your Next Double-Digit Profit Opportunity in the Food Industry

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The next titan of the food-delivery industry might actually be Facebook Inc. (Nasdaq: FB).

You see, on Oct. 13, the social media giant entered the online food-delivery business.

Through its "Order Food" option in the Facebook smartphone app, users can browse restaurants in the area that offer delivery and take-out options. Facebook is partnering with smaller delivery services like EatStreet, DoorDash, ChowNow, Olo, Zuppler, and Delivery.com, according to TechCrunch.

It's also working with restaurants directly for take-out options, and those restaurants include:

  • Jack in the Box
  • Five Guys
  • Papa John's
  • Wingstop
  • TGI Friday's
  • Denny's
  • El Pollo Loco
  • Chipotle
  • Jimmy John's
  • Panera

When a Facebook user decides what they want, they click "Start Order," and the food preparation begins.

Right now, FB CEO Mark Zuckerberg is not charging participating restaurants and delivery services fees or sharing in profits from the orders placed via Facebook.

That's because he's thinking bigger...

Zuckerberg doesn't need to take a cut of the $3.99 online delivery fee that services like Postmates charge. Instead, he's going after the U.S. digital advertising sector, which will account for 46% of all advertising by 2022, according to Forbes.

With Facebook offering food delivery, restaurants will want to increase their ad spending on FB to reach more customers. Five Guys, for example, could eventually pay to have an ad for a cheeseburger that takes users directly to Five Guys' "Order Food" section on Facebook when they click on the ad.

And with Facebook's 1.37 billion daily active users, restaurants have billions of customers they could reach each day.

Facebook partnering with smaller delivery services and restaurants directly is going to limit the amount of revenue Grubhub and Postmates can make. If you're holding out on the Postmates IPO in hopes of capturing 72% returns like Grubhub, the entrance of a $500 billion giant like Facebook in the online delivery market could dash your hopes.

But it also means Facebook is primed to profit even more from the industry's growth.

While we see online food delivery as an additional catalyst for revenue growth, we don't have any hard numbers yet, since Facebook just rolled out its food service less than a month ago.

However, we do know online ad spending as a whole is increasing, which will continue to add to Facebook's revenue totals. Digital marketing spending is projected to climb from $72.09 billion in 2016 to $120 billion by 2021, according to Forbes.

That's a 66.45% increase in just five years. Because of forward-thinking moves like integrating food delivery into the Facebook app, Money Morning Director of Technology & Venture Capital Research Michael A. Robinson projects the FB stock price will reach $250 per share by 2020.

"There is no question in my mind at this point that Facebook will hit $250. The only question is when, and 2020 strikes me as a solid forecast at this point," Robinson told me.

From today's opening price of $178.87, that's a potential profit of 39.76%. And while that's Robinson's prediction for 2020, that doesn't mean the Facebook stock price will stop climbing after it hits $250.

If there are two things Zuckerberg knows, they're how to scale a business and how to make shareholders a ton of money along the way.

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