PayPal Sinks Despite Meeting Estimates

PayPal Holdings Inc. (NASDAQ: PYPL) released third-quarter earnings report after markets closed on Thursday. The company said that it had $0.35 in in earnings per share (EPS) and $2.67 billion in revenue. There were consensus estimates from Thomson Reuters that called for $0.35 in EPS on $2.65 billion in revenue. The same period from last year had $0.31 in EPS on $2.26 billion in revenue.

In the third quarter, the company processed 1.5 billion payment transactions, up 24% from last year, which translates to 30 payment transactions per active account on a trailing twelve months basis, a 13% increase from a year ago.

Active customer accounts totaled 192 million, up 11% with growth of 19 million active customer accounts. PayPal processed a total of $87 billion in total payment volume (TPV), up 25%, or 28% on an FX-neutral basis.

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As for fourth-quarter guidance, the company expects to see EPS in the range of $0.40 to $0.42 and revenues in the range of $2.92 billion to $2.99 billion. The consensus estimates are calling for $0.42 in EPS and $2.97 billion in revenue for the coming quarter.

Dan Schulman, president and CEO of PayPal, commented:

We are pleased to have delivered another quarter of strong results. The opportunities for PayPal to grow and gain share have never been greater. We are executing against our strategic plan with intensity and speed, and we are committed to seizing the opportunities in front of us by truly embracing the mantle of “Customer Champion.” We are further expanding the ubiquity and value of the PayPal brand and moving deliberately towards achieving our vision of becoming an everyday, essential financial service for people around the world.

On the books, cash, cash equivalents, and short-term investments totaled $5.09 billion at the end of the quarter, versus $3.41 billion at the end of 2015.

Shares of Paypal closed Thursday at $40.09, with a consensus analyst price target of $44.94 and a 52-week trading range of $30.52 to $41.75. Following the release of the earnings report, the stock was initially down 2.4% at $39.11 in the after-hours trading session.

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