In an interesting MarketWatch article entitled "Are online auctions on their way out?" author Therese Poletti makes light of eBay's recent actions to replace the auction format with Buy-It-Now to compete with rival Amazon.
One particularly interesting quote from an analyst points to eBay's recent inflation of earnings by manipulating the numbers :
"The core eBay business has been deteriorating on an operating profit basis, only to be masked by performance from acquired and other business segments," said Jeetil Patel, a Deutsche Bank analyst, in a report last month. He noted that eBay's operating profit fell to $467 million in the first quarter, down from $472 million a year ago, and from $549 million in first quarter of 2008, excluding its PayPal, Skype and Gmarket contributions.Another intersting bit is when the author actually mentions eBay is alienating sellers to achieve this failure :
As eBay tries to keep up with Amazon, lowering its own up-front fees and making it easier for sellers to offer a wide variety of fixed price items, it has alienated many of its original smaller sellers -- those who sell collectible, one-of-a-kind, or antique items.
"I think it's gotten away from their core audience really," said Eric Larson, a vintage postcard seller in Mountain View, Calif., who mostly sells on his own website, CardCow.com. "It's harder to get good quality vintage items now." And does CEO John Donahoe realize that the entire world now sees that his foolish changes are killing eBay slowly and surely.
Ths is not a stock for the faint of heart !!
Source :
MarketWatch
