EBay Inc. said Wednesday that its fourth-quarter revenue rose 5 percent, as the healthy holiday shopping season bolstered growth in its online marketplace and PayPal online payments business.
The company's profit fell, since the year-ago quarter included a large gain from the sale of Internet communications business Skype. Excluding special items such as the Skype gain, eBay's fourth-quarter profit shot up 24 percent.
For the quarter that ended Dec. 31, the San Jose-based company earned $559.2 million, or 42 cents per share, compared with $1.35 billion, or $1.02 per share, in the year-ago quarter.
However, excluding one-time items, such as Skype, eBay earned 52 cents per share in the latest quarter, compared with 42 cents per share in 2009.
Analysts polled by FactSet expected an adjusted profit of 47 cents per share.
For the quarter that ended Dec. 31, revenue totaled $2.50 billion — a bit higher than the $2.48 billion analysts expected, on average.
Revenue from eBay's marketplace business, which is its largest unit and includes its namesake website, rose 4 percent to $1.52 billion.
The company said gross merchandise volume, which measures the value of all goods sold on eBay, excluding vehicles, increased 6 percent to $15 billion.
EBay.com counted 94.5 million active users at the end of the year, up 5 percent from the same quarter in 2009.
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