eBay reported third quarter 2008 earnings results a few minutes ago. Third quarter revenue was $2.12 Bilion (up $228 million from the same period in 2007). Net income on a GAAP basis was $492 million ($0.38 per diluted share), and non-GAAP net income was $592 million ($0.46 per diluted share).
“Overall, we are pleased with the performance of the portfolio this past quarter,” said eBay Inc. President and CEO John Donahoe. “We took a number of steps during the quarter to further strengthen our business and better align our cost structure to invest and compete. We will continue to stay focused on connecting consumers on our various ecommerce platforms, maintaining financial discipline and capitalizing on new opportunities for growth.”
Read the full press release, the Q3 2008 corporate fact sheet and other related materials at the new eBay Ink news site: http://blog.ebay.com/news.
To listen to the Q3 2008 Earnings call at 2pm PT this afternoon, please click here.
I will be live-blogging the earnings call for the second consecutive quarter on our Twitter feed at the same time (http://twitter.com/ebayinkblog).
Quarterly Business Highlights:
• eBay Inc. was honored by the White House and U.S. Department of Commerce with the National Medal of Technology for leadership in technology and innovation that has enabled millions of entrepreneurs to participate in the global ecommerce market.
• Marc Andreessen, founder of Netscape, Loudcloud and Ning, joined the eBay Inc. board of directors.
• eBay Inc. repurchased approximately 25 million shares of its outstanding common stock at a cost of approximately $623 million. Since the inception of the stock repurchase program in the third quarter of 2006, the company has repurchased approximately $5.3 billion of its common stock.
• eBay lowered listing fees for the Buy It Now format by more than 70% and extended listing periods to 30 days, up from seven.
• The company’s global classifieds businesses averaged 84 million unique visitors per month during the quarter, representing an increase of 55% year-over-year.
• StubHub entered into a partnership with the NFL’s New York Jets franchise to auction personal seat licenses for the football team’s new stadium.
• PayPal launched merchant services deals with Walmart.com, William Hill (U.K.), Continental Airlines, American Eagle Outfitters, BagsOK (China), newegg (Canada) and OfficeMax, among others.
• Payment volume from PayPal’s merchant services business exceeded the volume received from the eBay marketplace for the first time.
• Skype surpassed 13 million concurrent users at certain peak times.
• Skype-to-Skype minutes reached nearly 16 billion, a 63% increase year over year.
Cheers,
RBH