eBay Guidance Poses Performance & Valuation Questions (EBAY)

eBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) posted non-GAAP earnings of $0.38 EPS on $2.24 billion in revenues.  Thomson Reuters had estimates for the online auction giant pegged at $0.37 EPS and $2.14 billion in revenues.  The guidance for the company came in at $0.38 to $0.40 non-GAAP EPS and $2.2 to $2.3 billion in revenues for the current Q4 period.  After the run-up we have seen, that is not going to please even the most bullish fans of the stock as Thomson Reuters has estimates of $0.40 EPS and $2.26 billion in revenues.

As far as how this compares, the net income was down about 29% and margins are down to 28.4%; yet that is a year-over-year gain of more than $100 million in revenues.

The Payments business unit, or PayPal etc., reported a strong quarter with $688.1 million in revenue, an increase of 15% year over year.  Active registered accounts reached 78.0 million, an increase of 19% year over year.  The Marketplaces business unit (eBay, Shopping.com, StubHub, Kijiji and other e-commerce sites) recorded $1.4 billion in revenue, a 1% year-over-year decline.

Skype continued to grow and the unit contributed $185.2 million in revenue for the quarter, representing 29% year-over-year growth. Skype added 40.3 million registered users during the quarter and ended the period with more than 520.8 million registered users.  As a reminder, eBay has a pending deal to sell 65% of Skype and the status on that may be updated today, but eBay noted “that is expected to close in the fourth quarter.”

This stock had already overly participated in the market rally.  Shares closed down 0.1% at $25.03 today after hitting a 52-week high of $25.80 earlier in the day.  With the soft guidance seen, it is of little surprise at all that shares are down over 8% at $22.90 in the initial after-hours reaction.

JON C. OGG
OCTOBER 21, 2009