eBay Releases Third Quarter 2015 Earnings

by: JQ

Some bottom line numbers very conspicuously missing from the above press release:

Ebay GMV declined yet again by 2%.

Ebay marketplace revenue declined for the third consecutive quarter. It was down another 2%.

E-Commerce as a whole continued to grow at roughly 15%, so in actuality eBay's revenue is down 17% from where it would have been had the company performed at standard market level. This is the third consecutive quarter eBay's revenue has declined by more than 10% when adjusted to market standard performance.

Ebay continues to flounder. Nothing positive changed during this quarter. Up to this point there is no concrete evidence that Wenig's management team has been able to produce any positive change at eBay. The marketplace continues to perform as poorly as it did prior to the corporate split.

by: Orwellwasright

Quick ! lets suspend More Sellers!

lets institute more polices that favor the Chinese Junk dumpers so even more sellers are starved out

Its only been 7 years,  that stratagy will start working any day now,  never admit the ship is sinking even you're at the bottom of ocean

by: pace306

Well, eBay continues down the SAME EXACT PATH as before.

THEN, the CEO had no real experience, and now ..... the NEW CEO also has no experience. Just how does the BOD sleep at night ...?

Oh yeh, they dont make money of stock movement, they just get bonus's ... smart move 'cause if it was matched to stock pricing .... they'de all go hungry.

Nothing this quarter has changed from LAST. eBay is still universally hated by almost everyone except the people making bucks off their illegal methods and games - as well as TOOLGUY.

All major eBay "systems" are exactly the same, the same bufoons are still in charge, eBays community boards are still highly censored, eBay is still making back room deals with certain large accounts, search still doesnt work right, theft and fraud are RAMPANT (for everyone EXCEPT TOOLGUY) and eBays GMV is down AGAIN.

eBay us STILL absent from most major industry shows, all the industry magazines STILL ignore eBay, and of course .... Paypal is still helping them steal from sellers.

Should be a BANG UP 4th quarter.

by: maxmad

Actually from all the info I am reading they are up 7%

They pick what items and sellers that make the most money for them, and them only, the rest are dead weight or just filler, and are 100% disposable, and if you don't like their policies or fee's they don't care, get out of line, meet the death squad, they have plenty of sellers to pick from.







 

by: JQ

madmax, you are reading the press release, which was written in such vague terms I could not make any sense of it. What I did was simply open the link Ina provided to the actual 2015 Q3 financial report and found the bottom line numbers in a couple of minutes. The Marketplace brought in over $500 million less than it did during 2014 Q3, which was a bit more than a 2% decrease in gross revenue.

Press releases are just public relations attempts to spin the actual numbers that are contained in the financial reports. It probably is best to not read the press reports and just look at the numbers.

by: JQ

Here are the bottom line numbers

GMV (Gross Merchandise Value, or the amount of stuff listed for sale on the site) declined YTY (comparing this quarter to the same quarter in 2014) declined by $433 million, or 2%.

Net revenue (the amount of revenue eBay receives from selling fees on the marketplace) declined by $51 million during the same period, also a 2% decline.

by: maxmad

@JQ

yes my mistake,  your right, -2%  

by: The End

Ebay shouldn't be focused on focusing.
Ebay needs to stand down, remove all the bells and whistles.
Go Plain Vanilla.
The sellers have a handle on their own policies and protocols.
List it, Sell it, get paid the sellers' way.
3% take rate.
GET TO WORK !

by: Shop and Ship

2% here, 2% there ... pretty soon we'll be talking about some real money: $500,000,000.00  

by: Ric

"eBay revenue fell 2% year-over-year..." a disaster regardless of the excuses offered up by eBay's new senior executive team.


"The dollar amount of goods sold by eBay's US sellers in the third quarter was only 3% higher than the third quarter of 2014." .... Factor increased shipping costs included in the selling price of fixed price transactions, and the reality is that sales are flat or in decline.

"The deceleration was driven by investments in increased seller promotions such as eBay Top Rated Seller and Daily Deals programs, the company explained."  So, with casual sellers declining, eBay volume is generated by Top Rated Sellers, so eBay is justifying 'deceleration' based in part on the discounts Top Rated Sellers receive. TRS sellers should expect that eBay will find new ways to deprive them of their hard earned discount in order to slow the 'deceleration'.

"Despite disruption by launching a new mobile experience, the percentage of GMV that closed on mobile still increased to 42% in the quarter, up 1% from last quarter."  Yet somehow, PayPal is telling a majority of sellers their mobile transaction volume is zero. Will anyone attempt to explain the conflicting data these two companies are stating?

"Talking very quickly in his presentation, Wenig outlined again for analysts his 3-pronged strategy and, referring to his last presentation in July, said "we are doing what we said we would do."

"The CEO presented information about its efforts to move toward structured data, which it said would help it leverage data to improve the user experience, SEO, merchandising, and the seller listing flow."

In other words, eBay allegedly has another long term plan for turning the marketplace around.  Sellers will no doubt recall the 3 year plan proposed by John Donahoe which over the course of 7 years produced zero positive results for buyers, for sellers, or for eBay.  Sounds much like the smoke and mirrors produced by the previous management - same song - just a different singer.

by: CaddyShack

I sell mostly vintage items, or items I pick up at a good price. I also do hand made wood items. My hats off to all the sellers that can make it selling new items. I don't know how you can compete with all the items coming in from China. They get free shipping thanks to our government and the postal service. We the american worker keep paying for and supporting other countries at our expense.

by: flybuy

Does Ebay take into account lot of people are selling via Facebook or Instagram? I am a vintage seller and when I ask around several ecommerce  acquaintances say they are selling more on IG than on Ebay or Etsy.    

by: flybuy

Does Ebay take into account lot of people are selling via Facebook or Instagram? I am a vintage seller and when I ask around several ecommerce  acquaintances say they are selling more on IG than on Ebay or Etsy.    

by: blaumann

Thya want to increase small sellers with unique items? Quit the insane suspensions. Remove listing fees. Stop stealing by tacking FVF from shipping. Quit trying to be Amazon.

by: blaumann

Just mayne they should stop throttling sales? Ebay is destroying itself.  

by: FEEbay

They are going away in 2016..... This is nonsense....

by: SirRocko

Anyone know how these numbers compare to Amazon?  I'm not even sure if Amazon has released their Q3 numbers yet.  

by: serioussellers

Is the GMV the total of all the actual dollar amounts that eBay buyers agreed to pay when they ''clicked'' to allegedly purchase something - whether they ever paid or not?  Or is it a total of the inflated/phony (alleged sales) amounts that eBay shows to viewers after ''sales'' (also whether or not the buyers ever paid)?  Or is it a total of actual amounts received from eBay buyers (including shipping)?  Or is it perhaps a magical and creative eBay assemblage of all or some of the above?

While considering which method (or combination) was creatively used by the eBay accounting wizards, an equally crucial question is ... what huge percentage of that needs to be deducted from ''total sales'' because of returns ''funny business'' &/or non-payments?

If you sell $800 gazillion, but your hard to please disappointed buyers/borrowers forced refunds totaling $400 gazillion, any touted alleged gains don't just get reduced a little bit, they get obliterated.

An accurate report & analysis of the real numbers would certainly more completely reveal the true catastrophe.

Based on the MANY detailed & credible reports on this site & elsewhere, the tsunami of fraudulent/manipulated/forced returns (that are so aggressively encouraged & enabled by eBay) virtually wipe out a huge chunk of the original ''sales'' totals.

[ Hypothetical Example: ]  If a customer saw a vintage studio art glass vase that was listed for $1,000, decided to put in a $600 offer when it was on a 2 day sale for $900, and then actually paid (after the struggling small ''blacked out'' seller accepted the $600 offer for the vase that had somehow been miraculously ''found'' on eBay), does eBay use the $600 amount ... or does it use the $900 amount that it fraudulently shows on its site as being the sold amount (making neophyte viewers think that they too can list their identical item & get $900) -- or does eBay stretch the truth even more and just document it as a $1,000 transaction?  The thrilled buyer then displayed the vase to enjoy &/or impress for a week or two (or, as often happens, possibly for MONTHS) ... then claimed it was not as described because the base's diameter (measured with the buyer's plastic ruler) was allegedly 1/16'' larger than described in the listing.  So the suddenly unhappy and disappointed buyer decided that it did not properly fit -- or did not look as good as planned/desired -- on the base on which it had been displayed for a couple of weeks/months.  Somehow, the buyer's outraged claims to the eBay/PayPal consortium got the buyer the (planned/desired) almost instant ''forced'' refund.  Perhaps the suddenly unhappy buyer (who had left positively glowing feedback within days of displaying their new treasured vase) got to keep the vase as well.  Perhaps it was returned, or perhaps a crummy ''substitute'' vase -- or a box of rocks -- was sent back.  Perhaps the seller never even knew that anything was happening because eBay's messages about the case disappeared into an eBay message black hole, instead of being promptly delivered to the seller's inbox.  There are so many possible variations of this all too common scenario.  Perhaps the seller's PayPal/credit card/bank account suddenly showed an unexpected $600 debit (prompting the seller to make some calls about this financial mystery) , perhaps the seller's exceptional seller ''ratings'' took an unmerited ''hit'', perhaps the buyer continued the thrilling buying/borrowing spree with dozens of other sellers, etc.  ..... It doesn't really matter .... since all the variations reveal the same basic ecommerce tragedy/disaster.

So, in the big picture, it doesn't truly matter whether in this hypothetical example eBay uses $600, $900 or $1,000 when calculating GMV..... but does anyone know which one eBay would claim to use?

And, regardless of which they use, have they ever revealed the total ''deductions'' due to returns (and due to non-payments, if they included amounts in their GMV total of items that were ''sold'' but remained unpaid) ??  

by: Volvo351

Lemmie try to work through the deliberately-confusing SPIN: eBay's biz is OFF 2%, in US dollars, but they're saying it's "really" UP due to a strong dollar? Is that the translation of Devil Wingnut's double-talk? IOW, if it weren't for the OIL BOOM that's strengthened the greenback relative to world currencies, Wingnut would have to flat-out ADMIT failure? But, he's got a cover story, and he's stickin' to it?

If I've failed to properly interpret the gobbledygook being spewed by eBay's current unqualified CEO, someone please fill me in.

by: Volvo351

OH, lemmie tell you something about that so-called "active buyer base" - I presume that includes my recent buyer from the island of Malta who hadn't made an eBay purchase [judging from FB record] in over a year. I am WAITING for a payment and a confirmed US shipping address. I don't know Malta from East Borneo, and I wouldn't ship THERE, either. Wanna bet that Devil counts this guy as "active?" On WHAT basis?

Their metric of "active buyers" has about as much credibility as the rest of the nonsense they spew.