eBay Q2 2024 Pre-Earnings Commentary & Highlights

Liz Morton

Published: Jul 29 2024 Updated: Aug 4 2024

UPDATE 7-31-24

eBay has released Q2 2024 results, reporting stalled Active Buyer stats, barely noticeable GMV growth and a lowered Q3 forecast that raises questions about whether CEO Jamie Iannone's enthusiast buyer strategy is really paying off.

eBay is set to report Q2 2024 earnings July 31 at 5:30 PM Eastern. Take a look back at highlights from Q2 and what's happening so far in Q3 2024!

Leadership Changes & Corporate News

eBay's current VP & Deputy General Counsel Markets & Privacy Ken Ebanks has stepped up to take over the role of interim General Counsel as Marie Oh Huber has completed previously announced departure.

VP Global Communications, Michelle Friedman has left the company to take on the same role at Samsara, a cloud platform built for tracking and analyzing data from physical operations.

VP Global Collectibles Gene Cook has also departed, with previous US GM Adam Ireland taking his place to lead this multi-billion dollar vertical at a critical time for the company.

eBay poached (now) ex-Collectors VP of Marketing Mike Nett as their new GM Trading Cards ahead of deal that sold off the eBay Vault to Collectors while acquiring Goldin Auctions.

eBay's M&A activity and resulting labor relations issues could soon come under increased legal and regulatory scrutiny as unionized workers at eBay-owned TCGPlayer have filed additional NLRB complaints and rallied to protest against alleged pregnancy discrimination.

Amanda Lewis, Co-Founder of the Responsible Online Commerce Coalition, has filed a petition with the Federal Trade Commission calling for an investigation into the TCGPlayer acquisition, citing “serious concerns about eBay/TCGplayer’s apparently deceptive and anticompetitive conduct” including illegal monopoly maintenance, anticompetitive rollups, junk fees, and competing directly with 3rd party sellers without disclosing to consumers they would be purchasing directly from eBay.

Investors have also "recommended" that eBay should engage an independent investigator to conduct a Values Assessment aimed at determining whether eBay is living up to (some) of the core values and cultural mission laid out in their Human Rights Policy.

That pressure comes as eBay must undergo 3 years of enhanced compliance monitoring, with a particular focus on Mergers and Acquisitions due diligence and risk, as part of the deferred prosecution agreement inked with the Department of Justice regarding eBay's criminal liability in the 2019 cyberstalking scandal that targeted journalists Ina and David Steiner of EcommerceBytes.

The last eBay employee charged criminally in the case, Senior Manager Special Operations Brian Gilbert, has finally been sentenced, while the related civil lawsuit continues mediation and discovery on the road to a 2025 trial date with surprising shake up in legal counsel.

In other M&A news, eBay's KnownOrigin NFT Marketplace is winding down its on-chain marketplace and minters 2 years after acquisition as cryptoart bubble pops.

CEO Jamie Iannone has publicly shrugged off competition from Temu and Shein while quietly growing sales from China in the last year - are cheap Chinese shopping apps more of a threat than eBay would like to admit?

Iannone and CFO Steve Priest have forecasted a return to GMV growth for eBay in Q3 or Q4 2024 and they appear to be pulling all available levers to try to make it happen.

From 15% off Gift Card sales and fee-free clothing selling in the UK to playing shell games with seller funded discounts and testing post-sale offer price matching, eBay may manage to squeeze out some temporary GMV gains but at what cost and will it be sustainable long-term?

Payments

eBay announced they have added Venmo as a payment option on the platform just days after also announcing they will no longer be accepting American Express as of August 17.

Express Payouts now incur a flat rate $2 fee versus previous 1.5%, raising the cost of payouts to a debit card for lower value items.

eBay has finally figured out how to fill the gap left when they lost PayPal Working Capital loans, introducing a new financing product through Liberis that allows seller payback with a percentage of sales rather than a fixed monthly payment.

Promoted Listings Ads

eBay's experiment with flat upfront fee ads for auctions has come to an end as Promoted Listings Express for Auctions was discontinued April 15 to make way for adding auctions to the existing Promoted Listings cost per sale product.

As part of the Summer Seller Update, eBay announced new names for existing ad products and a redesigned ad experience, promising "intuitive navigation and more advanced technology" - but sellers say the new eBay Ads dashboard is woefully lacking in granularity and transparency about key business metrics.

AI Initiatives, Focus Verticals Strategy

eBay has won Best Generative AI Solution at the 2024 AI Breakthrough Awards for their "magical listing" description generator. Was it a well deserved honor for game-changing tech innovation or just more marketing hype?

eBay is testing adding AI more overtly into search and discovery with generated search results and query prompting to curate a more personalized search experience, including a new feature called Explore that uses AI and visual search to help fashion buyers create curated shopping feeds.

They've also launched an AI powered background enhancer, allowing sellers to place items on a variety of generated backdrops for more professional looking presentation, but in initial testing the process was very laggy, often failed to load, and caused glitches in the background removal feature.

eBay has expanded luxury handbag and wallet authentication to include items under $500...for a fee.

And they're finally leveraging their acquisition of MyFitment to offer Fitment Plus, a new tool enabling Motors Parts & Accessories sellers to enhance listings with updated compatibility data.

However, the "enthusiast buyer focus vertical strategy" appears to be struggling to maintain momentum, especially in the trading cards and collectibles category where mega-seller Burbank Sportscards just announced they will be taking millions of cards off of eBay after signing an exclusive deal with competing marketplace, Fanatics Collect.

Shipping

US sellers can now leverage eBay International Shipping hubs to help reduce friction and risk of shipping to domestic locations in Alaska, Hawaii, and Puerto Rico.

eBay UK sellers were left with more questions than answers after the latest user agreement update revealed a new feature called Simple Delivery, prompting speculation eBay may be looking to copy competitor Vinted on delivery services.

eBay is finally taking action to crackdown on policy-violating Amazon dropshippers, blocking Aquiline & Bluecare Express shipping methods that are often used to circumvent dropshipping policies.

Technical Issues

eBay is seeking expert help to turn around outdated tech reputation with new Technology Communications role, leveraging media connections and PR to promote Chief Technology Officer Mazen Rawashdeh and "position eBay as a top-tier technology company."

Unfortunately, no amount of PR spin can overcome the almost 30 years of tech debt or gloss over the ongoing major technical malfunctions users experience on the site.

In April, a "systems issue" related to incorrect shipping addresses being attached to purchases caused many orders to be randomly canceled with no warning and no recourse if they had already been shipped.

Search continues to fail as eBay attempts to push more AI functionality into it, often returning wildly inaccurate and irrelevant results for common search terms.

And a widely publicized eBay Live charity event featuring Elton John turned into an embarrassing debacle of technical misexecution and poor leadership as pixelation, extreme lag and buffering turned everyone on camera into unidentifiable blobs moving around the screen.

That's it for the eBay Q2 2024 pre-earnings countdown - catch up on commentary from Q1 earnings and stay tuned for more Q2 coverage after the call from Value Added Resource!

eBay Earnings

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Liz Morton is a seasoned ecommerce pro with 17 years of online marketplace sales experience, providing commentary, analysis & news about eBay, Etsy, Amazon, Shopify & more at Value Added Resource!