14 DAY TRIAL // The economy may not be fully up and running, but some companies in the tech are now showing strong signs of recovery. After Google started the trend with better than expected revenue and profits in Q3 2009, eBay is now posting similar optimist results for Q4 and the entire year. Revenue was up 16 percent year-over-year in the final quarter of 2009, reaching $2.4 billion above market expectations of $2.29 billion.
This comes down to $0.44 earnings per share (EPS) versus estimates of just $0.40 EPS. For the full year, revenue was also above expectations coming in at $8.7 billion, slightly above the estimated $8.65 billion.
Income saw a huge boost of 300 percent compared to last year in the fourth quarter, reaching $1.36 billion, but this was mostly due to the partial sale of its communications unit Skype. The company still managed to squeeze some money out of the VoIP service before selling it off and reported revenue of $112 million from Skype in Q4.
Its bread-and-butter business, what it calls the Marketplaces unit, basically the eBay auctions site, finally saw a bump in revenue showing that it may be recovering as well. It brought in $1.5 billion in Q4, up 15 percent from 2008.
PayPal, the company's 'golden goose', made it $795.6 million in revenue in Q4, a 28 percent increase from the previous year. Another interesting metric, the total volume of money transacted through PayPal saw a 34 percent boost reaching $21.4 billion in the last quarter.
“We delivered a strong fourth quarter with double-digit revenue growth driven by exceptional performance at PayPal and turnaround progress and momentum in our core eBay business,” said eBay President and CEO John Donahoe. “PayPal significantly expanded its presence globally and, for the first time, processed more than $20 billion in total payment volume in a quarter. Gross merchandise volume and sold items accelerated for the third consecutive quarter. We are starting 2010 with significant progress against our three-year growth strategies for PayPal and eBay and a clear focus on our priorities going forward,” he added.