EBay Falls on Disappointing Outlook Ahead of Holiday Season

eBay (NASDAQ:EBAY) stock traded nearly 6% lower in Thursday’s premarket as the company’s fourth-quarter outlook disappointed and reflected its own pessimism over the upcoming holiday season.

The online marketplace expects fourth-quarter sales between $2.57 billion and $2.62 billion, lower than last year’s $2.9 billion and also short of the $2.65 billion analysts’ estimate put out by Bloomberg.

EBay ended the September quarter with 154 million active buyers, down 5% from a year earlier. Gross merchandise volume, which is the value of all goods sold on the site, fell 10% to $19.5 billion as stores opened and consumers stepped outside to shop on their return to more normal lives after more than a year of the pandemic.

The company will expand its stock buyback program to $7 billion from $5 billion.

Third-quarter revenue increased 11% to $2.5 billion, fuelled by robust growth at its payment services and the expansion of its advertising portfolio. It earned 90 cents per share on an adjusted basis. Both sales and profit were higher than estimates.