eBay Listings Off to a Strong Start In 3Q06

Caris & Company analyst Tim Boyd updated clients on the outlook for eBay's (EBAY) listings at the start of 3Q06. His note follows:

• Our QTD core (i.e. excluding Stores) listings count is up 33% Y/Y – this represents a material increase
from the 22% rate that eBay posted in 2Q06.
• Our QTD Stores global listings count is up 100% Y/Y – this represents a material deceleration from the
178% rate that eBay posted in 2Q06.
• We estimate full-quarter listings of 643MM (up 40% Y/Y), which is roughly 6% higher than
our published estimate of 608MM (up 33% Y/Y).
• Core and Store made up 82% and 18%, respectively, of 2Q06 listings. QTD, we see the mix at
84%/16% -- this supports our thesis that 2Q06 will be the trough quarter in terms of listings
monetization.
• On a smoothed, rolling-13-week basis, we see core global listings growing at 44% Y/Y, core U.S.
listings growing at 28%, and core International listings growing at 60%. All three of these growth
rates are tracking higher than their 13-week averages – a positive indication.
• QTD, we are tracking Y/Y listings growth acceleration in the U.S., Germany, U.K, Taiwan, Australia,
Korea, Hong Kong, India, Sweden and New Zealand.
• QTD, we are tracking Y/Y listings growth deceleration in France, Canada, China, Italy, The
Netherlands, Belgium, Austria, Spain, Singapore, Switzerland and Ireland.
• We maintain our Above Average rating on EBAY shares.

click all images to enlarge them

Comments

[Rick Williams:]

Mr. Boyd may want to read an excellent paper published in the Journal of Marketing Vol. 70 (January 2006) authored by Fornell, Mithas, Morgeson, and Krishnan: "Customer Satisfaction and Stock Prices: High Returns, Low Risk". Last year Ebay held a relatively good customer satisfaction rating. This year, I suspect a significant drop in customer satisfaction coupled with other market forces will keep Ebay well away from their 52 week high and relatively close to their low. To get an indication of the depth of customer consternation; type the following into any Google search bar "Beware of Ebay and Paypal" or visit themwed.org and click the banner on the right of the page.

Rick Williams
PS: Below is one of many examples.

Search Money Message Boards:
MSN Money Home>Message Boards>EBAYQuic... links
Next topic
Previous topic
My settings and messages
If you are considering Ebay stock then go here to see how they treat their vendors as 2nd class citizens
1 messages - 1 authors - last updated 07/24/06 11:56 PM
Delete discussionEdit forum settingsEdit board settingsNew message boardMessage #1 - Posted by LosingMyBusiness2China on 07/24/06 11:56 PM
forums.ebay.com/db2/fo...

This is the pulse of the selling community. In it you'll see just how Greedbay or FEEbay devalues individual business owners. Since the announcement on July 19th, it has turned peoples lives upside down causing them to scramble to save their businesses. I don't think people realize just how patronizing and demeaning this company is to force sellers to pay higher fees while other sites get a free ride. To basically create this havoc while American jobs have to close because they cannot compete with China. Sometimes making money is not as important when it comes to the devastation of up to half a million stores globally

No one hears me or other ebayers. We are just crybabies. Crybabies that work very hard despite search manipulations and customer service that is worse than Dell's

2006 Jul 28 05:49 PM

[Postcards 4...:]

If the quantity of listings is the main indicator of strong growth, then eBay is more than happy to manipulate those figures for you. All it takes is a bit of 'selling strategy', coupled with what is already in place.

The entire Pacific Rim eBay community enjoys "NO Fee" Stores and Listings. That is NO FEE for what on every other site, requires considerable expense. To be fair, those Fee-Free Asian sites do pay a Final Value Fee (FVF), but don't expect that to bring in much revenue.

You see, those industrious sellers know how to manipulate their own financial gain! All it takes is to sell the item for 1-cent and charge a high shipping cost. The FVF is charged to only the selling price, not to the shipping cost. So, just what is the FVF on 1-cent? $0.01 X 0.05 = $0.00

Oh, a few side benefits of this type of "Market Flood" is that American buyers are duped, ebay.com is saturated with cheap goods and those Listing Quantities look GREAT!

2006 Aug 01 06:06 PM