What Happened?

Shares of online grocery delivery platform Instacart (NASDAQ: CART) jumped 6% in the afternoon session after the company launched an embedded shopping and checkout app inside ChatGPT, making it the first grocery partner to offer such a feature. This integration allowed users to discover recipes, create grocery lists, and complete the entire checkout process without leaving the chat conversation. The new app connected ChatGPT's capabilities with Instacart's fulfillment and delivery network. According to a statement from Morgan Stanley, this move gave Instacart an early lead over competitors like Walmart and Amazon, neither of which had a similar grocery feature available on the AI platform. The announcement was consistent with the company's focus on growth through partnerships, as its CFO noted Instacart would continue to "lean into" collaborations.

The shares closed the day at $46.24, up 3.9% from previous close.

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What Is The Market Telling Us

Instacart’s shares are quite volatile and have had 17 moves greater than 5% over the last year. In that context, today’s move indicates the market considers this news meaningful but not something that would fundamentally change its perception of the business.

The previous big move we wrote about was 7 days ago when the stock dropped 3.1% on the news that reports surfaced that its competitor, Amazon, launched an ultrafast grocery delivery service, sparking concerns about increased competition. The move from the e-commerce giant directly challenged Instacart's core business. According to reports, Amazon's new service planned to deliver groceries and other essential items in 30 minutes or less across major U.S. cities. The service had already been launched in Philadelphia and Seattle. This development led investors to fear that Instacart could face significant pressure from a powerful new rival in the delivery space, prompting a sell-off in its shares.

Instacart is up 7.4% since the beginning of the year, but at $46.24 per share, it is still trading 13% below its 52-week high of $53.15 from February 2025. Investors who bought $1,000 worth of Instacart’s shares at the IPO in September 2023 would now be looking at an investment worth $1,372.

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