eBay (EBAY) on Wednesday after the closing bell reported a top-and-bottom-line beat for the fourth quarter, helped by its eBay Live holiday shopping events and AI initiatives, among other things, and the e-commerce giant provided a better-than-expected forecast for the current quarter and approved a $2B stock buyback.
Shares of the company are up more than 8% in early premarket trading on Thursday.
In a separate press release, eBay announced that it will purchase the secondhand clothing marketplace Depop from Etsy (ETSY) for $1.2B in cash in a move to capture the Gen Z and Millennial customer base.
The company also hiked its cash dividend for the first quarter to $0.31 per share, from a previous payout of $0.29 per share. The dividend is payable on March 20 to stockholders of record as of March 6.
For Q1, eBay expects net revenue between $3B and $3.05B, ahead of the consensus estimate of $2.80B, and non-GAAP earnings per share of $1.53 to $1.59, ahead of the $1.48 per share estimate.
“We have built significant momentum across our strategic priorities, delivering meaningful growth and reinforcing our leadership in recommerce,” CEO Jamie Iannone said. “As we continue to harness AI to elevate the customer experience worldwide, eBay is in the strongest position it has been in years.”
In Q4, gross merchandise volume was $21.2B, up 10% on an as-reported basis and up 8% excluding forex impact.
Active buyers—buyers who paid for a transaction on the company’s marketplace platforms in the past 12 months—were up 0.75% from last year at 135M.
Net income for the quarter was $525M, or $1.14 per share, compared to $680M, or $1.40 per share, for the same period last year, weighed down by higher operating expenses.
Excluding one-time items, earnings per share from continuing operations were $1.41, beating the average analyst expectation by 6 cents.
Net revenue was up 15% at $3B and topped estimates by at least $100M.