eBay Pretends It Has Visibility To 2011 (EBAY)

eBay Inc. (NASDAQ: EBAY) rose in after-hours trading after the online auction offered bulish guidance out to 2011 at its analysts’ day.  There are many caveats.

For starters, eBay talked about its marketplace business slowing in 2009.  We noted this over the weekend for newsletter subscribers about the angry discourse we are seeing in eBay auctions.

The company also noted that there are “currency headwinds” it is facing this year.  Now the company is stating that it will grow out to 2011, but that forecast is contingent on the economy returning to some sense of normalcy in 2010 and 2011.

As far as 2011, it sees total revenue of $10 billion to $12 billion in 2011.  Of that, some $1 billion will be from Skype and $5 to $7 billion will be from its marketplace operations (compared with $5.6 billion in 2008).  The fixed-price format buying (the Buy it now! feature) generated about $2 billion last year, and it sees double-digit growth there over the coming years.   eBay’s Marketplaces Classifieds generated $1 billion last year in revenues, and it claims this will double by 2011.

Where this gets interesting is that the company has said that its auction revenue could be cut in half in 2011 from $2 billion in 2008.  The company also said non-GAAP earnings should grow in a mid-single digit range to 2011.  The company also expects PayPal margins should reach 18% to 20%.

eBay further said that an opportunity ahead is also in the secondary market of merchandise and inventory liquidators, which eBay thinks is about a $500 billion global market.

One of the more interesting independent headlines from other news agencies that listened to the call was the CFO being “MIFFED” about how the stock market is valuing the company.

JON C. OGG