EBay, Skype, and PayPal–Oh My!

EBay is one of the oldest and most successful auction websites on the Internet. It connects buyers and sellers much like Buy.com or Amazon.com, some of its nearest competitors. Since the rise of those competitors, EBay has been struggling, but this last quarter was an incredible rally for them.

“We are cautiously optimistic about slow, steady progress in the global economy,” said eBay Chief Executive John Donahoe on a conference call.

Fourth-quarter net profit was $1.4 billion, or $1.02 per share, up from $367 million, or 29 cents per share, a year earlier.

On an adjusted basis, profit was $585.8 million, or 44 cents per share — above analysts’ average forecast of 40 cents per share, according to Thomson Reuters I/B/E/S. Revenue rose 16 percent to $2.37 billion, also beating Wall Street expectations.

Revenue rose 11 percent in the United States and 21 percent internationally.

EBay sold the bulk of its Skype Web telephone unit, deemed a bad fit with the company, for about $1.9 billion in November to an investor group. EBay retains a 30 percent stake in Skype.

The sale of Skype certainly helped the bottom line, but so did the performance of Paypal–that web payments unit saw a 28% rise in revenue just in the last quarter.