PayPal Forecasts Growth, Easing Concerns Over Losing eBay

PayPal reported earnings that beat analysts’ estimates in the first quarter and gave an optimistic forecast for the second, signaling that it’s weathering the loss of eBay as it continues to sign up new accounts, according to Bloomberg.

For the current quarter, the company projected net revenue of $3.78 billion to $3.83 billion, compared with the average analyst estimate of $3.75 billion. In first three months of the year, PayPal had revenue of $3.69 billion, higher than analysts’ projections for $3.59 billion.

eBay, PayPal’s former parent company and longtime payments processor, said in January that it would gradually shift its business to Adyen, a startup based in the Netherlands. PayPal will remain a checkout option for shoppers until at least July 2023, but Adyen will gradually take over processing of eBay payments, beginning this year in North America.

Dan Schulman, PayPal’s CEO, has been expanding partnerships with companies once viewed as threats, like Apple and Facebook, and making acquisitions to strengthen its position. He’s pushing for PayPal to become a more versatile financial tool, rather than just a payment button on a website, and expand access across the financial services industry.

PayPal’s popular peer-to-peer payments system has continued to see strong growth, but it has yet to be a key revenue driver. Schulman said earlier this year that he believes it will make money some day. But transaction growth on Venmo slowed to 80 percent last quarter compared with the prior period. Last quarter, PayPal handled $132 billion in payment volume, an increase of 32 percent.