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Uber’s Waymo Detour Tests the Stock’s Robotaxi Bull Case
Author: Jeffrey Neal Johnson. First Published: 7/1/2026.
Key Points
- Uber shares fell after Waymo ended its Phoenix robotaxi partnership, raising concerns about Uber’s access to the autonomous vehicle supply.
- Uber’s broader autonomous strategy still includes partnerships with Waymo in other markets, along with Nuro, Lucid, and other developers.
- Uber’s cash flow, Uber One membership base and buyback program give the company more flexibility as the robotaxi market evolves.
- Special Report: Forget SpaceX. Buy the company Musk can't replace.
When headlines hit the wire that Alphabet (NASDAQ: GOOGL) subsidiary Waymo was removing its autonomous vehicles from the Uber app in Phoenix, the market reacted with predictable, reactionary selling. Shares of Uber Technologies (NYSE: UBER) slid more than 4% on June 29 after the news was released, pushing the stock down nearly 12% year to date and leaving it near $72.
The knee-jerk interpretation is that Uber is losing its grip on the autonomous vehicle revolution, sidelined by a vertically integrated giant that has decided to go it alone. But a step back reveals the underlying mechanics of marketplace dynamics. The withdrawal of a dozen Waymo vehicles in a single metropolitan market is not a structural failure of Uber’s long-term business model.
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Watch the full story and see the verified track record for yourselfInstead, it serves as a highly visible stress test for autonomous demand aggregation. By rapidly rotating the Uber supply chain and leaning on massive core cash flows, Uber is proving that localized fleet shifts cannot fracture a globally entrenched membership moat.
Pumping the Brakes: Waymo’s Phoenix Power Play
To understand the Waymo exit in Phoenix, you have to look at how autonomous fleet economics scale. Waymo has spent years meticulously mapping and testing in the Phoenix area. It has achieved geographic density, brand penetration, and a critical mass of proprietary hardware in that specific region.
When an autonomous vehicle operator reaches that level of local maturity, it gains the leverage to bypass third-party aggregators and direct consumers to a proprietary application, capturing the full unit economics of the ride. Waymo reallocating those vehicles to a proprietary platform and securing a separate delivery agreement with DoorDash (NASDAQ: DASH) demonstrates that top-tier developers view third-party networks as supplementary distribution channels in established, highly saturated markets.
Scaling that density nationwide requires staggering capital expenditure. That is exactly why the broader Uber-Waymo alliance remains active in newer autonomous markets like Austin and Atlanta. Autonomous operators still require massive, pre-existing user bases to efficiently penetrate new geographies and sustain fleet utilization rates during early-stage scaling. An empty robotaxi burning miles without a passenger is a massive liability. Uber provides instant demand, solving the utilization equation for these nascent fleets.
Firing on All Cylinders: Uber’s Massive Operating Leverage
While the market obsesses over future robotaxi market share, current operating metrics provide a rigid valuation floor. Uber Technologies is no longer a cash-burning growth experiment dependent on venture subsidies. Uber has structurally matured, generating $1.9 billion in non-GAAP operating income in the first quarter of 2026, representing a massive 42% year-over-year increase.
That immense operating leverage is directly funding a $3 billion share repurchase program. When a management team aggressively buys back stock during localized operational turbulence, it signals deep confidence in the durability of the underlying cash flows.
Those cash flows are largely insulated by the rapid expansion of the subscription ecosystem. Cross-platform Uber One members recently surpassed 50 million, accounting for over 50% of total gross bookings. When you lock tens of millions of consumers into a recurring membership that incentivizes them to use a single application for mobility, food delivery, and freight, you neutralize the revenue impact of isolated supply-chain disruptions. The consumer does not care if the vehicle arriving is driven by a human, guided by Waymo, or powered by another autonomous developer. They simply want the ride fulfilled within the app they already pay a monthly fee to use.
Swapping Parts: Building a Bulletproof Supply Chain
The terminal valuation of a mobility network relies heavily on becoming an indispensable, neutral demand aggregator. If a single autonomous provider achieves a monopoly on the supply side, it can dictate pricing, leading to severe margin compression for the aggregator.
The strategic countermeasure to vendor lock-in is supplier fungibility. If one partner leaves, another must immediately plug into the network. Uber Technologies is already executing this exact playbook. Uber is actively preparing a replacement partner for the Phoenix market to backfill the Waymo vacancy. More importantly, Uber is rapidly advancing a high-volume integration utilizing the Nuro Driver artificial intelligence system on Lucid Group (NASDAQ: LCID) vehicles.
This multi-year program targets a 35,000-vehicle fleet exclusive to Uber, launching in the San Francisco Bay Area in late 2026 and expanding to Houston by mid-2027. Combined with recent strategic agreements with international developers like WeRide, these moves demonstrate rapid backfilling capabilities. The supply chain is becoming modular, protecting Uber against vertical monopolies and ensuring continuous capacity in contested markets.
The Smart Money Is Riding Shotgun
Follow the derivative markets, and a much more optimistic narrative emerges. While retail sentiment soured on the Phoenix headlines, institutional capital appears to be taking the other side of the trade. July 2026 options chain data reveals unusually heavy call volume clustered at the $77 and $85 strike prices. This suggests sophisticated market participants are positioning for a near-term bullish reversal, heavily discounting the localized Waymo turbulence.
Insider alignment further refutes the bearish narrative. Chief Executive Officer Dara Khosrowshahi maintains substantial equity exposure. While recent regulatory filings show multi-million dollar stock liquidations, these trades were executed concurrently with massive retention awards, including the receipt of 293,637 new stock options.
These scheduled sales align with standard Rule 10b5-1 trading plans rather than opportunistic insider selling. When leadership continues to hold and vest massive blocks of equity alongside aggressive corporate buybacks, it telegraphs strong conviction in the broader multi-partner autonomous marketplace.
The Road Ahead: Dominating the Next Mobility Cycle
The transition from human-driven ride-hailing to an autonomous mobility network will inevitably face friction. Individual partnerships will form, evolve, and occasionally dissolve as hardware developers test pricing power. By actively diversifying its autonomous fleet and leveraging its 50-million-strong membership base, Uber is effectively turning competing robotaxi fleets into interchangeable commodities.
The true metric to watch over the coming quarters is not whether a single partner stays or leaves a specific city, but whether Uber can seamlessly route massive consumer demand to the provider with the most efficient capacity. Investors observing the current pullback might consider how a diversified, multi-partner supply chain ultimately secures long-term marketplace dominance.
Dividend Increases: From Over 10% Yields to Over 10% Dividend Growth
Author: Leo Miller. First Published: 6/24/2026.
Key Points
- A mortgage REIT with a yield already well above 10% just issued a solid boost to its quarterly payment.
- A consumer staples stock putting up large returns just lifted its dividend by 14%, staying with its multi-year trend of large increases.
- After appointing a new CEO, this large retailer is seeing a resurgence in its shares while also providing a strong dividend yield.
- Special Report: Forget SpaceX. Buy the company Musk can't replace.
Several stocks spanning the range from high dividend yields to high dividend growth just added more juice to their payouts. These names offer yields that stretch above 13% at the high end, while also posting recent dividend increases of up to 14%. That gives investors multiple ways to play the yield-versus-growth spectrum.
Annaly: High-Yield Mortgage REIT With Notable Risks
Annaly Capital Management (NYSE: NLY) is a real estate investment trust (REIT) with a very high dividend yield. The company is specifically involved in managing mortgage-backed securities (MBS) and other types of debt.
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Discover the gold income fund before the next payout dateAs a mortgage REIT, the company’s value proposition is its ability to identify and generate returns on MBSs, which then flow to its bottom line. After its latest dividend increase of 7%, Annaly now offers an indicated dividend yield near 13.5%. The company’s next dividend is payable on July 31 to shareholders of record as of June 30.
However, one important risk to understand is Annaly’s use of leverage to generate returns, which increases both upside and downside volatility. Still, Annaly argues that it uses leverage more effectively than others in its industry.
Specifically, the firm notes that its economic return per unit of leverage is 2%, or 30% higher than that of the average mortgage REIT.
In other words, to generate the same gain on its underlying investments, the company has used less leverage than its competitors. Annaly has executed its strategy well, delivering a total return of more than 40% since the start of 2025. Roughly half of that return has come through dividends. Overall, Annaly’s large dividend yield is appealing, but leverage risk is something investors must take into account.
Casey’s: Rapid Dividend Growth, but a Rising Share Price Weighs on Yield
Casey’s General Stores (NASDAQ: CASY) may not be in tech or artificial intelligence, but this consumer staples stock has been delivering big returns nonetheless. After rising 40% in 2025, Casey’s has gained approximately 50% in 2026. The convenience store and gas station chain has made a name for itself because of its in-house food, best known for its pizza.
The company has consistently outperformed analyst expectations, with its latest earnings report serving as another reminder. Sales grew 14.5% year over year (YOY) to $4.57 billion, solidly beating estimates, while earnings per share (EPS) soared 66% to $4.37. This allowed Casey’s to crush expectations of $3.31 by more than $1, sending shares up 20% afterward.
Casey’s also announced a substantial dividend increase of 14%. As Casey’s share price has performed well, large dividend increases have also become common, with this marking the fourth year in a row that Casey’s has boosted its dividend by 13% or more.
However, while Casey’s dividend has grown at a fast pace, its share price has grown faster, leaving the stock with a low indicated dividend yield near 0.3%. The company’s next dividend is payable on Aug. 14 to shareholders of record as of the Aug. 1 close. Overall, dividend income is lower on the list of reasons to own Casey’s. However, the company’s willingness to strongly increase its capital returns is a nice cherry on top of its impressive underlying performance.
Target: Rebounding Retailer With an Over 3% Yield
Another impressive story in the consumer staples sector is Target (NYSE: TGT). After delivering a return of -25% in 2025, Target appointed a new CEO near the beginning of 2026. So far, the move appears to be paying off. After posting five straight quarters of negative sales growth, Target grew revenue by 6.7% YOY in its latest quarter. Not only did the figure return to positive territory, but it was also Target’s highest sales growth rate in approximately four years.
Target also saw a strong improvement in its EPS, which rose 31% YOY to $1.71, handily beating estimates of $1.47.
The company now expects to grow sales by about 4% during the full year, which would be its best annual growth rate since 2022. As Target works to turn around its business, shares have delivered a return of more than 30% in 2026.
Notably, Target has also announced a small dividend increase of just under 2%, moving its quarterly payout to $1.16. The company’s next dividend is payable on Sept. 1 to shareholders of record as of the Aug. 12 close.
Despite Target’s latest increase being modest, the stock’s dividend yield remains relatively high, near 3.5%.
Target also has a very long track record of dividend increases, having raised its payment for 54 years in a row. With this, Target provides investors with a solid dividend yield while also offering upside potential should the recovery in its financial performance continue.
Annaly, Casey's, and Target: Different Flavors of Dividends and Growth
While Annaly, Casey's, and Target offer very different dividend profiles, all are showing a strong desire to return increasing amounts of capital to shareholders. Investors should also know that Annaly can significantly cut its dividend at times. This happened in 2023, when the firm reduced its dividend by approximately 26%.
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