Instacart CEO Rogers calls grocery competition fears ‘overblown’

Instacart‘s stock surged more than 14% after the company‘s robust results alleviated worries over mounting competitive pressures in the grocery delivery market.

During an earnings call with analysts, CEO Chris Rogers, who took the helm last year, called the concerns “overblown” and said the company monitors threats “extremely closely.”

“There is definitely a market for us here and we feel good about our points of differentiation,” he said.

Instacart is facing an increasingly competitive market as retailers like Amazon and food platforms such as Uber Eats and Doordash aggressively scale in grocery delivery. At the same time, the company is investing in new technology and artificial intelligence tools to drive more customers and businesses to its platform.

Wall Street analysts viewed Instacart’s results as a wave of confidence for those worried about the company’s moat. Analysts at Bernstein called the report a “solid rebuttal” to competitive pressures and AI threats.

“The clean beat-and-raise has been rare this internet earnings cycle and CART stands out from that perspective,” wrote analysts at Barclays.

The San Francisco-based company reported better-than-expected fourth-quarter revenue and said gross transaction value (GTV) grew 14%, representing its strongest quarterly growth in three years.

Orders totaled 89.5 million, topping a StreetAccount estimate of 87.8 million.

Instacart also issued an optimistic forecast, calling for GTV in the range of $10.13 billion and $10.28 billion, versus a $9.97 billion estimate from StreetAccount.

The company expects between $280 million and $290 million in adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization, versus $277 million expected.