If eBay buys StubHub, shareholders need to speak up

I wanted to reward a friend with tickets to a Yankee game - one of the final games of the year. I decided to purchase tickets from StubHub. I realizing the tickets had been marked-up; nevertheless, this was a special event.

Not including the tickets, I spent $4k to in hotel, air and more just to travel to and from NYC.

The "expensive" tickets: over $2k

The original owner of the tickets: A Yankee season ticket holder. Ask me for his name.

When I attempted to use the tickets, the Yankees refused me at the gate. The tickets are invalid.

For more info:
http://stubhubsoldmeinvalidtickets.blogspot.com/

Brian,

Skype is not a comparable acquisition to use in this "finger wagging" piece you wrote since is a telecom business. Please compare $300 million for StubHub to EBAY's purchase of Shopping.com for $620 million in CASH...

Brian, you must be an amateur analyst or wannabe investor because your commentary is like a group of girls gossipping and sniping at each other.

I just love armchair critics like you. If you were such a sophisticated investor/analyst you wouldnt be blogging. If you understood anything about Ebay fundamentals and intrinsic value in light of all the so called negatives, you would quickly realize how undervalued this stock is. Put your money wear your mouth and then talk. That's right put up a significant amount cash in shorting this stock. Let's see how strong your convictions are and superficial analysis.

Bravo, BRAVO ...Sigh
Many at times I just L.O.L
Teach them to listen at/to the company fundamentals and busniess model, "they" you know yourself.. and the analyst are just a group of ...@&%*$..... just fill in the blank at your choosing.

Remember that spaghetti sauce commercial from the 1970s – I think it was for prego sauce where the mother keeps asking –do they have garlic and the answer was “its in here”….what about onions..? ”Its in there” Well “its in there” is the answer to every point you have brought up all year. In other words its all factored in the stock price and then some.


Let me explain to you why I'm looking forward to ebays next two or three earning reports. Ebays is set to show 30% growth in revenue this year. Todays stock price is assuming that ebay can grow at 30% for ONE YEAR more and then 4% only FOREVER.

Now, 4% forever for ebay is the equivalent of NO GROWTH for most companies because ebay has enough pricing power in both its monopolistic auction business and paypal to raise prices this much per year easily. So the market is saying after this year – no more growth. Think about this.

Well it will be very interesting to see ebay put up 30% growth numbers for another quarter or two or three – eventually the revenue and cash flow numbers are going to be so high in a few more quarters that the market is going to go nuts – there is no way it will be able to hold the stock price down to this level much longer if those kind of growth numbers are met in the next two quarters (and they are easily going to hit those numbers this quarter)

So when you talk about the negatives, they are meaningless without reflecting that against the stock price which I have not seen you do.

Yes, ebays growth is slowing in the US – but the stock price is more than reflecting this. What many growth lovers never comprehend is that this slowing growth is actually a VERY POSITIVE thing when the stock price has fallen to a level that reflects low growth. The reason why is that once ebay saturates its market it can declare itself KING. In a saturated market its going to be very hard for another company to take any share from ebay. An expanding high growth market is nice- but it allows competitors to move in more easily and capture parts of the growing market – (see ebays experience in Korea as an example of this) So to a value investor, seeing that the markets are getting saturated makes you more sure that the revenues from the source are secure. You adjust down the growth numbers in your models but the model is more likely to be precise for the reasons explained and as long as the stock price is low enough, then these can be very lucrative situations for investing.

What is also often forgotten with all the focus on core listings is that paypal is a large part of this company. I suspect paypal will eventually be larger that the auction business – but because the company name is ebay, everyone is focused on the auctions – make sure you consider all revenue sourse both present and future when valuing the company.

Now please make a point that won't elicit the answer “its in there”

Need I say more?

Now I'm ready for your facts Brian. Hit me with your hardest shot. I'm fully invested in Ebay. Now show put your money where your mouth is.

Brian
Thats WHY you are WHERe YOU SHOULD BE.

Let's talk about Skype shall we? First alot of people poo pooed on PayPal. Again Patience. Skype was purchased for 2.4 billion dollars (if targets met then 4.4 billion). Do the math and compare it to vonage. That's $20 (2.4 billion/120 million) per suscriber in terms of acquisiton cost. That is freakin cheap compared to Vonage at $400/user and burning money like no tomorrow on marketing! It takes time to monetize this business as things are rapidly changing. They are on track to hit $200 million end of 2006. Think about it they are the largest telecom company in the world with low infrastcture cost. YOu have to be a fool to dismiss the potential of this company. EBAY, PayPal and Skype have a large MOAT=Network Effect=Barrier to Entry.

How do I know this shit? Because I made significant amount of money on USG, CME, and NYX. I have heard the same weak ass arguements over and over in these instances. I love it because with these negative sentiment echoed by so called analyst, media pundits and whining people with self serving agendas, I can pick up these stocks dirt cheap! Look at them all jumping on the bandwagon after pooing pooing this stock. Wall street is so predictable is like watching lemmings walking off a cliff.

Brian by the way.....I purchased skype for FREEE at $24. Because it's all in the..spaghetti saunce. So if anything comes out of SKYPE. It's all gravy. Mmmmmm mmmmm good.

Of course you don't Brain, no need for you to have a clue.
You said it in itself. You don't OWN ANY- not a single piece.

Brian, I agree with you! sigh (that's an appropriate name because I "sigh" every time I read his/her post) and Ann, (I often can't understand a word she is saying) Me thinks (that’s a joke Ann) they must have bought eBay at $48 and are just crying because its at $30 - 9 months later. It seems low $30’s is a good number. It’s going to on this side of $48 for quite awhile.

Okay Ann and Sigh let me have it. Should I prepare for the slings and arrows?

Randy, Are you one of the not so can make it on Ebay
merchants?
No need to answer the question.
Even some one who can't not "Me thinks" knows the answer.
So run along little boy.

Ouch! All in fun folks.

Sorry Randy I really didn't want to rub it in but feel for your story.

Brian,
I assume we are talking about acquisitions in general and the wisdom involved in the purchases.. So speaking of acquisitions, I agree with you. Getting into the "ticket" business seems very risky for ebay. There is already lots of trouble and fraud there and ebay doesn't seem to handle all that very well... Will there be more lawsuits on the horizon..?

As for Skype.. Meg says she sees buyers and sellers jumping on that. I don't think so.

And I think it's ironic that Meg and team see any value in phone communication for a sellers customers.. since ebay itself has never seen any value in that form of communication for it's customers. I think this power is a drag.

To get an idea of how excited and interested ebay customers seem to be with Skype, visit the Skype discussion board. Page one covers from 8/20/06 to the present time... about a month and a half of comments (there are trolls and ebay "voices" there too). All in all, Skype appears to be a pretty dead subject.

http://forums.ebay.com/db2/forum.jspa?forumID=2000000001

Ebay management doesn't seem to understand the "signs of the times". Ebay has set some great examples.. of what to do and what NOT to do. There is competition out there working everyday to succeed.. some of them will.

It seems that Google is quietly working to succeed with their Checkout and have already succeeded to top Paypal in some areas.. using a form of ebay's bag of tricks to inspire customers.
This may be one that will succeed.. especially since there have been so many negative reports and horror stories about Paypal (really scary).. without seeing much of any change or improvements in Paypal's manner of doing business.

http://tinyurl.com/zozcn