SAN JOSE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--eBay Inc. (Nasdaq:EBAY) today reported financial results for its first quarter ended March 31, 2008. The ecommerce company posted first quarter revenue of $2.19 billion, up $424 million from the same period last year. Revenue growth was driven primarily by Marketplaces net transaction revenues, the ongoing expansion at PayPal, Skype and the company’s global classifieds business. The company’s global footprint helped it benefit from strength in other currencies, relative to the U.S. dollar. The company recorded net income on a GAAP basis of $460 million or $0.34 per diluted share, and non-GAAP net income of $562 million or $0.42 per diluted share.
GAAP operating margin decreased to 25.2% for the quarter, compared to 26.5% for the same period last year. Non-GAAP operating margin decreased to 32.0% for the quarter, compared to 33.6% for the same period last year. The decrease in operating margins was caused primarily by our faster growing lower-margin businesses, such as PayPal and Skype.
eBay Inc. generated $766 million of operating cash flow during the first quarter. Free cash flow during the quarter was $632 million.
“This was a very strong financial quarter for the company,” said eBay Inc. President and CEO John Donahoe. “The results reflect the strength provided by our diverse portfolio of businesses. Our stability and growth continues to give us the confidence to make innovative changes to our products to keep customers engaged for years to come.”
Quarterly Business Highlights
- John Donahoe assumed the role of chief executive officer on March 31.
- eBay rolled out several initiatives in an effort to enhance user experience on the site -- primarily by re-structuring fees for sellers and introducing a default search order based on relevance and seller quality.
- The company repurchased approximately 37 million shares of its outstanding common stock at a cost of approximately $1 billion.
- eBay Motors reached a milestone with its 3 millionth vehicle sold on the site.
- PayPal signed Merchant Service account deals with JetBlue Airlines, Ferrari Store (Italy), CompUSA and Office Depot (U.K.), among others.
- PayPal completed the acquisition of Fraud Sciences to accelerate the development of its fraud detection tools.
- PayPal expanded its seller protection plan for eBay Power Sellers.
- Skype named Josh Silverman as its chief executive officer on February 25.
- Skype achieved 100 billion cumulative Skype-to-Skype minutes.
- The company’s global portfolio of classifieds businesses reported a 101% increase in unique visitors year over year, with an average of 70 million monthly unique visitors.
- StubHub announced a deal making it the online ticket marketplace for the Daytona 500.
- The company completed the reorganization of select North American and European functional groups to align more closely with strategic priorities.
“We are pleased with our first quarter results. We generated strong revenue growth, even stronger earnings growth and excellent free cash flow. During the quarter, we opportunistically repurchased approximately 3% of eBay shares outstanding," said Bob Swan, eBay Inc. CFO. "We are seeing some positive early indicators based on our key initiatives, but there is still much work to be done. For the remainder of 2008, we'll continue to focus on the strategies we've put into motion, and we believe our guidance will allow us to invest in, and make the necessary changes to, our business while still delivering on our financial commitments."
