Moderated By: Doug Fowler -- (Not Moderated) -- Started: 8/13/1998 8:14:00 PM Revision History
eBay, the largest and most successful person-to-person Internet auction company, plans to go public in late September. If you think OnSale is doing well, you will love eBay.
eBay is one of the few profitable Internet companies, and revenues are growing very quickly, practically doubling every sequential quarter. Revenues for the latest quarter were almost $9 million.
Right now, 600K auctions are conducted weekly on eBay.
The reason the eBay model is so superb is that eBay doesn't carry any inventory at all. It simply extracts a listing fee for each auction, and about a 2.5 percent commission on all closed sales.
eBay is one of the Internet's most popular destinations, and people stay on eBay when they get there. It is not uncommon for someone to spend several hours a day, searching out all the great deals on computers, collectibles, etc.
I expect this to be one of the hottest, if not THE hottest IPO of the year.
One of the things that will really be great for Internet investors is that it is easy to see how fast eBay is growing by simply tabluating the number of auctions going on at any point in time. I have been doing this for the past several months, and the number has been growing steadily.
And eBay isn't yet doing even half the things it could be doing to increase revenues. Advertising, e-mail letters, sponsorships -- all are being extremely under-utilized.
eBay is a great example of the opportunities in e-commerce.
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