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EBAY, eBay Inc.

Commercial Services & Supplies asset-light

EBay Inc. is a global commerce leader that connects people and builds communities to create economic opportunity for all.

Our technology empowers millions of buyers and sellers in more than 190 markets around the world, providing everyone the opportunity to grow and thrive.

Our Marketplace platforms, including our online marketplace located at www.ebay.com and its localized counterparts, our off-platform marketplaces and our suite of mobile apps, together, create one of the world's largest and most vibrant marketplaces for discovering great value and a unique selection.

Latest annual: FY2025 10-K

EBAY · eBay Inc.

The business

What it sells, where the money comes from, the kind of company it is.

Revenue · FY2025

$11.1B

+7.9% YoY · 5% 5-yr CAGR

Vital signs · TTM, with 5-yr average

Revenue $11.6B 5-yr avg $10.3B

Gross margin 72% 5-yr avg 73%

Operating margin 19.6% 5-yr avg 22.9%

ROIC 22% 5-yr avg 17%

Owner-earnings margin 15% 5-yr avg 18%

Free cash flow margin 15% 5-yr avg 18%

The business in brief

read the 10-K →

What this business is and what moves its needle, from its own SEC filings.

What it is: Revenue is Marketplace revenues (82%) and Advertising revenues (18%).
What moves the needle: Gross margin has run about 75% and operating margin about 23% through the cycle, a wide spread between price and the cost of what it sells — whether that advantage is durable pricing power or a margin that can erode is the question the record is for. The cash cycle has run negative through the cycle (a median of −29 days): the operation is paid before it pays, so working capital releases cash as the business grows rather than tying it up. On its own account, the filing leans hardest on pricing power & competition, set against the numbers in what the filing emphasizes, below.
Is it a good business?: Return on capital has run in the teens (median 16%, above 15% in 5 of 9 years), though buybacks and expensed R&D and brands shrink the capital base, so the figure overstates the underlying economics. The steadier read is owner earnings: roughly 22% of revenue reaches owners as cash, consistently, and customers and suppliers fund the business through negative working capital. Returns like these are solid but short of clear franchise economics; whether they hold is what the 10-K settles, not the multiple.

Every line is arithmetic on the company's filings, shown in full in the sections below.

Where the money comes from

read the 10-K →

Marketplace revenues is 82% of revenue, with Advertising revenues the other meaningful line at 18%.

Revenue by product line, FY2025

Marketplace revenues82%$9.1B
Advertising revenues18%$2.0B

By geographyUnited States52%United Kingdom14%Rest of world14%China11%Germany9%

From the segment footnote of the company's own 10-K. Shares are of total revenue; the profit bar shows each segment's share of segment operating profit, before unallocated corporate costs.

The record

Ten years of arithmetic, read across the cycle.

The record, 2016–2025

realized figures from each filing · older years to the left

2016’16	2017’17	2018’18	2019’19	2020’20	2021’21	2022’22	2023’23	2024’24	2025’25	TTMTTMMar 2026
											Income statement
$9.3B	$9.9B	$8.7B	$7.4B	$8.9B	$10.4B	$9.8B	$10.1B	$10.3B	$11.1B	$11.6B	RevenueRevenue
78%	78%	77%	79%	80%	75%	73%	72%	72%	71%	72%	Gross marginGross mgn
10%	10%	11%	13%	11%	9%	10%	12%	9%	11%	12%	SG&A / revenueSG&A/rev
12%	12%	12%	13%	12%	13%	14%	15%	14%	15%	15%	R&D / revenueR&D/rev
$2.3B	$2.3B	$1.8B	$1.8B	$2.6B	$2.9B	$2.4B	$1.9B	$2.3B	$2.3B	$2.3B	Operating incomeOp. inc.
25.0%	22.8%	20.3%	23.8%	29.6%	28.1%	24.0%	19.2%	22.5%	20.5%	19.6%	Operating marginOp. mgn
$7.3B	($1.0B)	$2.5B	$1.8B	$5.7B	$13.6B	($1.3B)	$2.8B	$2.0B	$2.0B	$2.0B	Net incomeNet inc.
—	—	5%	11%	13%	1%	—	25%	13%	13%	12%	Effective tax rateTax rate
											Cash flow & returns
$2.8B	$3.1B	$2.7B	$3.1B	$2.4B	$2.7B	$2.3B	$2.4B	$2.4B	$2.0B	$2.2B	Operating cash flowOp. cash
$605M	$612M	$591M	$572M	$560M	$485M	$442M	$441M	$370M	$421M	$462M	DepreciationDeprec.
($5.5B)	$3.1B	($928M)	$341M	($4.2B)	($11.9B)	$2.6B	($1.4B)	($519M)	($1.1B)	($960M)	Working capital & otherWC & other
$626M	$666M	$623M	$508M	$463M	$444M	$449M	$456M	$458M	$525M	$486M	CapexCapex
6.7%	6.7%	7.2%	6.8%	5.2%	4.3%	4.6%	4.5%	4.5%	4.7%	4.2%	Capex / revenueCapex/rev
$2.2B	$2.5B	$2.0B	$2.6B	$2.0B	$2.2B	$1.8B	$2.0B	$2.0B	$1.4B	$1.7B	Owner earningsOwner earn.
23.7%	25.0%	23.5%	35.1%	22.0%	21.2%	18.4%	19.5%	19.0%	12.9%	14.5%	Owner earnings marginOE mgn
$2.2B	$2.5B	$2.0B	$2.6B	$2.0B	$2.2B	$1.8B	$2.0B	$2.0B	$1.4B	$1.7B	Free cash flowFCF
23.7%	25.0%	23.5%	35.1%	22.0%	21.2%	18.4%	19.5%	19.0%	12.9%	14.5%	Free cash flow marginFCF mgn
$212M	$34M	$302M	$0	$0	$0	$208M	$38M	$13M	$208M	$130M	AcquisitionsAcquis.
—	$0	$0	$473M	$447M	$466M	$489M	$528M	$533M	$531M	$536M	Dividends paidDiv. paid
$2.9B	$2.7B	$4.5B	$5.0B	$5.1B	$7.1B	$3.1B	$1.4B	$3.1B	$2.5B	—	BuybacksBuybacks
13%	7%	13%	16%	22%	17%	—	12%	20%	21%	22%	ROICROIC
69%	-13%	40%	62%	159%	139%	-25%	43%	38%	44%	46%	Return on equityROE
—	−13%	40%	46%	147%	134%	−34%	35%	28%	33%	34%	Retained to equityRetained/eq
											Balance sheet
$7.1B	$5.9B	$4.9B	$2.8B	$3.5B	$7.3B	$4.8B	$2.0B	$2.4B	$1.9B	$2.9B	Cash & investmentsCash+inv
$592M	$696M	$712M	$555M	$362M	$98M	$90M	$94M	$108M	$135M	$152M	ReceivablesReceiv.
$283M	$330M	$286M	$229M	$278M	$262M	$261M	$267M	$257M	$242M	$311M	Accounts payablePayables
$309M	$366M	$426M	$326M	$84M	($164M)	($171M)	($173M)	($149M)	($107M)	($159M)	Operating working capitalOper. WC
$8.9B	$7.7B	$7.1B	$4.7B	$7.2B	$9.1B	$9.3B	$11.0B	$7.6B	$5.1B	$6.3B	Current assetsCur. assets
$3.8B	$3.6B	$4.5B	$4.1B	$4.0B	$4.6B	$4.3B	$4.5B	$6.1B	$4.6B	$5.1B	Current liabilitiesCur. liab.
2.3×	2.2×	1.6×	1.2×	1.8×	2.0×	2.2×	2.4×	1.2×	1.1×	1.2×	Current ratioCurr. ratio
$4.5B	$4.8B	$5.2B	$4.5B	$4.3B	$4.2B	$4.3B	$4.3B	$4.3B	$4.5B	$4.5B	GoodwillGoodwill
$23.8B	$26.0B	$22.8B	$18.2B	$19.3B	$26.6B	$20.9B	$21.6B	$19.4B	$17.6B	$17.9B	Total assetsAssets
$9.0B	$10.0B	$9.2B	$7.8B	$7.7B	$9.1B	$8.9B	$7.7B	$7.4B	$6.7B	$7.7B	Total debtDebt
$1.8B	$4.2B	$4.3B	$5.0B	$4.3B	$1.8B	$4.1B	$5.7B	$5.0B	$4.9B	$4.8B	Net debt / (cash)Net debt
10.3×	7.8×	5.4×	5.7×	8.7×	10.9×	10.0×	7.4×	8.9×	9.3×	9.3×	Interest coverageInt. cov.
$10.5B	$8.0B	$6.3B	$2.9B	$3.6B	$9.8B	$5.2B	$6.4B	$5.2B	$4.6B	$4.4B	Shareholders’ equityEquity
4.5%	4.9%	5.4%	5.6%	4.7%	4.6%	5.0%	5.7%	5.7%	5.5%	5.4%	Stock comp / revenueSBC/rev
											Per share
1.14B	1.06B	991M	856M	718M	663M	558M	533M	501M	468M	457M	Shares out (diluted)Shares
$8.13	$9.33	$8.73	$8.68	$12.39	$15.72	$17.55	$18.97	$20.52	$23.72	$25.39	Revenue / shareRev/sh
$6.35	$-0.96	$2.55	$2.09	$7.89	$20.52	$-2.27	$5.19	$3.94	$4.34	$4.47	EPS (diluted)EPS
$1.92	$2.33	$2.05	$3.04	$2.72	$3.34	$3.23	$3.70	$3.90	$3.06	$3.69	Owner earnings / shareOE/sh
$1.92	$2.33	$2.05	$3.04	$2.72	$3.34	$3.23	$3.70	$3.90	$3.06	$3.69	Free cash flow / shareFCF/sh
—	$0.00	$0.00	$0.55	$0.62	$0.70	$0.88	$0.99	$1.06	$1.13	$1.17	Dividends / shareDiv/sh
$0.55	$0.63	$0.63	$0.59	$0.64	$0.67	$0.80	$0.86	$0.91	$1.12	$1.06	Cap. spending / shareCapex/sh
$9.20	$7.56	$6.34	$3.35	$4.96	$14.75	$9.23	$12.00	$10.30	$9.86	$9.65	Book value / shareBVPS

Per-share growththe realized rate an owner's share compounded

	9-yr	5-yr
Revenue / share	+12.6%/yr	+13.9%/yr
Owner earnings / share	+5.3%/yr	+2.4%/yr
EPS	−4.1%/yr	−11.3%/yr
Dividends / share	—	+12.8%/yr
Capital spending / share	+8.3%/yr	+11.7%/yr
Book value / share	+0.8%/yr	+14.7%/yr

The record, charted

FY2016–2025

Each measure over its full record; the current point and the worst year marked.

Share count

468Mpeak FY2016

ROIC

21%low FY2017

Gross margin

71%low FY2025

Net debt ÷ owner earnings

3.4×peak FY2025

Owner earnings vs. net income

Owner earningsNet income

The accountant's number, and the cash an owner can take; the gap is the tell.

$1.4Bowner earningsvs.$2.0Bnet incomelow FY2025

Where the cash went

ReinvestBuybacksDividendsAcquisitionsRetainedBeyond op. cash

Each year's outlays against its operating cash: the mix, and how it drifts. The hatched cap is spending beyond that year's operating cash — financed from the balance sheet or borrowing, not operations.

FY2016FY2025

Owner-earnings bridge

FY2021–FY2025cash-flow statement, SEC EDGAR →

Net income is the accountant's number; owner earnings is the cash an owner could take out. The walk between them, off the cash-flow statement, and whether the gap is widening or holding.

In fiscal 2025 the business reported $2.0B of profit but $1.4B of owner earnings: $597M less than the profit line, taken out by capital spending and the timing of cash.

Reported net income$2.0B

Owner earnings$1.4B · 13% of revenue

	FY2025	FY2024	FY2023	FY2022	FY2021
Reported net income	$2.0B	$2.0B	$2.8B	($1.3B)	$13.6B
Depreciation & amortizationnon-cash charge added back	+$421M	+$370M	+$441M	+$442M	+$485M
Stock-based compensationreal costnon-cash, but a real cost	+$607M	+$588M	+$575M	+$494M	+$477M
Working capital & othertiming of cash in and out, other non-cash items	−$1.1B	−$519M	−$1.4B	+$2.6B	−$11.9B
Cash from operations	$2.0B	$2.4B	$2.4B	$2.3B	$2.7B
Capital expenditurecash put back in to keep running and to grow	−$525M	−$458M	−$456M	−$449M	−$444M
Owner earnings	$1.4B	$2.0B	$2.0B	$1.8B	$2.2B
Owner-earnings marginowner earnings ÷ revenue	13%	19%	19%	18%	21%

Owner earnings is the cash an owner could pull out without starving the business: operating cash less the capital it must spend to hold its position . The cash-flow statement also adds stock comp back as non-cash, but it is a real cost paid in shares; counted as the expense it is (less $607M), owner earnings is nearer $827M.

Much of fiscal 2025's profit didn't arrive as operating cash; it sits in “working capital & other” above. That can be a real inventory or timing swing, or profit that doesn't run through operating cash at all: a heavy tax year, equity-method earnings, or investment income booked through investing. For a year like this, owner earnings understates the cash earned; the full cash-flow statement carries the rest.

Maintenance capex is estimated as depreciation where a growing business invests above it; free cash flow is the figure the scorecard's free-cash margin reads.

III

Quality & stewardship

Returns, the balance sheet, capital allocation, and pay.

Owner’s Scorecard

FY2025 10-K · source on SEC EDGAR →

Will it survive?

Can it pay its interest? 9.3×

Comfortable

Operating income $2.3B ÷ interest expense $246M

What this means
Operating profit covers interest with the kind of margin Graham wanted for a defensive holding. Necessary, not sufficient, it says solvent, not cheap.
How heavy is the debt, net of cash? $3.2B · 1.4× operating profit

Modest net debt

Cash $1.9B + ST investments $2.6B − debt $7.7B

What this means
Netting $4.5B of cash and short-term investments against $7.7B of debt leaves $3.2B owed, about 1.4× a year's operating profit (3.4× on the gross debt, before the cash). Net debt is the leverage figure that matters: the cash is already set against the debt. Strategic or illiquid investments aren't counted here.
How long is cash tied up? -23d

Negative, funded by others

DSO 4 + DIO 0 − DPO 28 days

What this means
Days cash is tied up between paying suppliers and collecting from customers. A negative cycle is a quiet moat: suppliers and customers fund the operation (Buffett's “float”), the company grows on other people's money. (Little or no inventory, a services / asset-light model, so the inventory leg is ~0.)

Is it a good business?

Return on invested capital 16%

High through the cycle

9-yr median, range 7%–22%; 19% latest = NOPAT $2.0B ÷ invested capital $10.5B

Industry peers: median 11%

What this means
The rate the business earns on the money tied up in it, Buffett's north star, because over time a stock tracks the ROIC beneath it. Above ~15% sustained hints at a moat; a return below the cost of capital (~8%) erodes value as a business grows rather than building it — the test Buffett weighs most. The headline is the median of the last 9 years (it ran 19% most recently), so one peak or trough year doesn't set the verdict. Asset-light businesses (R&D expensed, little capital) read artificially high, pair this with Owner Earnings.
Owner-earnings margin 21%

High through the cycle

10-yr median margin, range 13%–35%; latest $1.4B = operating cash $2.0B − maintenance capex $525M

Industry peers: median 18%

What this means
What an owner could take out without starving the business: operating cash less the maintenance capital it must spend to hold its position — Buffett's owner earnings. That's 13% of revenue this year, a 21% median across 10 years. Treating stock comp as the real expense it is (less $607M of SBC) leaves $827M.
Are earnings backed by cash? 0.96×

Mostly cash-backed

Cash from ops $2.0B ÷ net income $2.0B

What this means
How much of reported profit showed up as operating cash. Above 1× is reassuring; well below suggests earnings lean on accruals. One year is noisy, growth and working-capital swings distort it, and this is operating cash, not free cash. Watch the multi-year trend.

How is the cash used?

Where do the earnings go? 211%

Returned more than it generated

Dividends + buybacks $3.0B ÷ Owner Earnings $1.4B

What this means
The company returned more than it generated: against $1.4B of Owner Earnings, $3.0B (211%) went back to shareholders, $531M dividends, $2.5B buybacks — the excess came from the balance sheet or borrowing, not the year's operations. Net of $607M stock comp, the real buyback was about $1.9B. Sustained, that pattern draws down cash or adds debt; the net-debt line above shows where it stands.
Investing or harvesting? 1.25×

Expanding

Capex $525M ÷ depreciation $421M

What this means
Descriptive, not a grade. Above ~1× means investing faster than assets wear out (growth, or, sustained for years, today's earnings carrying less depreciation than tomorrow's will). Below means spending less than it's wearing out (efficiency, or a melting asset base). The ratio won't tell you which; the filings will.

Graham’s defensive tests · 1 of 6 met

Graham’s numerical criteria for the defensive investor (The Intelligent Investor, ch. 14), run on the filings. A floor of safety, not a buy signal; many fine modern businesses fail his strictest liquidity rules by design.

Adequate size Pass

Revenue ≥ $2B · $11.1B

What this means
Big enough to weather a storm. Graham's 1972 floor was ~$100M of sales (≈ $700M today); we use a $2B revenue line as a conservative modern stand-in.
Strong liquidity Miss

Current ratio ≥ 2× · 1.10×

What this means
Current assets at least twice current liabilities, near-term bills covered without touching the business. Strict by design: many cash-rich modern firms run leaner and miss it, holding their cushion in longer-dated securities.
Conservative debt Miss

Debt ≤ working capital · $7.7B vs $449M WC

What this means
Graham's rule that borrowings not exceed net current assets. Capital-heavy and buyback-heavy firms routinely fail it, read it next to interest coverage, not alone.
Earnings stability Miss

A profit every year (10-yr record) · 2 loss years

What this means
Graham wanted earnings in each of the past ten years, the stability a defensive owner leans on.
Dividend record Miss

Uninterrupted dividends · 7 of 10 yrs

What this means
An unbroken dividend was Graham's mark of durability. He wanted twenty years; the filings show about ten, and a single suspension breaks the streak. Non-payers, many fine modern compounders, fall outside his defensive net by design.
Earnings growth Miss

Earnings +33% over the record · −23%

What this means
At least a third more earnings than a decade ago, averaging three years at each end. Net income (not per-share), so stock splits don't distort it, buybacks and dilution show up in the share-count line instead.
Moderate price —

P/E ≤ 15 and P/E × P/B ≤ 22.5 · decided by the price

What this means
Graham's valuation gate, the wall he kept between a sound business and a sound investment. Three-year average earnings are $5.08/share (latest year $4.57), the averaged base the calculator's gate runs on, and book value is $10.39/share. Enter a price in “What the price implies” just below for the P/E, P/B, and whether it clears. But this is the rule Buffett outgrew: there's no hard P/E law, and a wonderful business can deserve a far richer multiple if the thesis holds, treat it as the bargain-hunter's floor, not a verdict on the price.

Durability & moat, 2016–2025

Whether the record’s returns held, and what the capital reinvested earned.

Profitable years 8 of 10

What this means
Lost money in 2 year(s), look at what happened there before trusting the average.
Return on capital ≥ 15% 6 of 10 yrs

What this means
A moat shows up as a high return on invested capital that holds year after year, not one good vintage.
Operating margin 23% → 21% (3-yr avg ends)

What this means
Through the cycle the operating margin held roughly steady — about 23% early, 21% lately, median 23%.
Reinvestment, incremental ROIC returns capital

What this means
The capital base barely grew: this business returns cash through dividends and buybacks rather than reinvesting. Judge it on the cash returned, not on compounding.
Owner earnings growth −4%/yr

What this means
Owner earnings shrank about 4% a year over the record.
Worst year 2023 · 19.2% op. margin

What this means
Stayed profitable even in its hardest year, the resilience that survives recessions.
Dividend record rising

What this means
Paid and raised the dividend across the record, the continuity Graham prized.

Does AI threaten the moat?

Elevated contestability

The product is software or information, the very thing capable AI now produces more cheaply, so the moat is more contestable than the record alone implies.

In its own filing A competitive risk, new this year

Its FY2025 10-K names artificial intelligence as a competitive threat, in language that was not in the prior year's filing.

“We compete with a wide and growing variety of online and offline businesses that provide similar goods and services across numerous industries and geographies in which we operate, including traditional retail, e-commerce, live commerce, advertising, search engines, social media, and AI-powered tools (such as agents and…”

AI has collapsed the cost of building a capable substitute for the very thing this business sells. When a credible alternative can be assembled for a fraction of the incumbent's price, it is pricing power that erodes first, not revenue tomorrow. The live question is whether the moat survives that, not whether it held in the past. Whether that question is answerable at all is yours to decide, against your own circle of competence.

Read from the filing's own risk factors, paired with the industry's structure under its SIC code; the durability is read above, the price below.

All figures as filed; the source filing is linked above.

Current Position

as of the latest quarter, Mar 31, 2026

Can the business pay what it owes this year, off the freshest balance sheet: the quality of the assets, the debt actually coming due, and what a low ratio means here.

Current assets$6.3B

Cash & short-term investments$2.9B
Receivables$152M
Other current assets$3.2B

Current liabilities$5.1B

Debt due within a year$750M
Accounts payable$311M
Other current liabilities$4.1B

Current ratio1.22×all current assets ÷ what's due · Graham looked for 2×

Quick ratio1.22×stricter: inventory excluded

Cash ratio0.57×strictest: cash alone against what's due

Working capital$1.1Bthe cushion left after near-term bills

Debt due this year vs. cash$750M due · $2.9B cash covered by cash on hand, no refinancing forced · both figures from the Mar 31, 2026 balance sheet

Revenue, latest quarter vs. a year ago+19.5%the freshest read on whether the business is still growing

Current ratio, recent quarters1.3× → 1.2×

Deeper floors

Tangible book value($170M)equity stripped of goodwill & intangibles

Net current asset value($7.2B)Graham's net-net: current assets less all liabilities

Debt incl. operating leases$8.2B$458M of it operating leases

Deferred revenue$50Mcustomer cash collected before delivery; operating float

From the company's latest filing.

How the cash was used, 2016–2025

Over the record, the business generated $25.9B of operating cash; how management split it reads as a cash returner, paying most of what it earns straight back to owners.

Reinvested$5.2B · 20%
Dividends$3.5B · 13%
Buybacks$37.5B · 145%

Returned to owners$41.0B
199% of the owner earnings the business produced over the span, $3.5B as dividends and $37.5B as buybacks.
Source of funding−$20.4B
Reinvestment and shareholder returns ran $20.4B beyond the operating cash the business generated, so the gap was financed off the balance sheet: cash and short-term investments drew down $4.2B.
Average price paid for buybacks$49.80
Across the years where the filing reports a share count, 754M shares were bought for $37.5B, about $49.80 each. Year to year the price paid ranged from $25.82 (2016) to $105.30 (2021), and 2021, near the top of that range, was also its heaviest buyback year ($7.1B).
Net change in share count−60.1%
The diluted count fell from 1144M to 457M, so the buybacks outran the stock issued to staff.
Dividend record$1.13/sh
Paid in 7 of the years on record. It was never cut over the span.

Buybacks are gross of stock issued to staff; the share-count line above is the net of that, the figure that decides whether owners gained. The average price paid blends a year of purchases (and any accelerated repurchase), so it is close, not exact. The record of where the cash went and on what terms.

Acquisitions & goodwill

from the balance sheet & the 10-year cash-flow record

Goodwill grows only when a company acquires and falls only when it concedes it overpaid. The size of that bet, the cash put into buying rather than building, and how much has already been written off.

Goodwill & intangibles$4.6B26% of all assets; the premium carried on the balance sheet for businesses acquired

Against book equity97%goodwill is this share of book equity; the rest is the company’s own retained and paid-in capital

Cash spent acquiring$1.0Bover 10 years buying other businesses, against $5.2B of capital spent building

None written down over the record; the goodwill is still carried at full cost. That is the deals holding their value on the books so far; whether they keep doing so is the test an owner watches, since the write-down, when it comes, is the admission the price was too high.

Goodwill, acquired intangibles and equity from the latest balance sheet; acquisition spend and write-downs summed across the 10-year record, from the company's own filings.

Management, ownership & pay

read the proxy →

From the proxy: how much of the business the people running it own, and how they are paid, beside what the business earned for its owners in the same years.

Fiscal year	Chief executive	Pay, as filed	“Actually paid”	Owner earnings
2021	Mr. Iannone	$21.7M	$45.4M	$2.2B
2022	Mr. Iannone	$17.0M	−$18.1M	$1.8B
2023	Mr. Iannone	$21.6M	$24.8M	$2.0B
2024	Mr. Iannone	$20.3M	$49.1M	$2.0B
2025	Mr. Iannone	$28.5M	$74.4M	$1.4B

Both pay figures are the company’s own, from the pay-versus-performance table its proxy statement files. “As filed” is the Summary Compensation Table total: salary, bonus, and equity awards at their value on the day of grant. “Actually paid” is the SEC’s prescribed recalculation, which re-marks those equity awards to what they became as they vested; it can swing far above or below the filed figure in either direction, and negative years occur. Owner earnings are the whole business's, from the record above, for the same fiscal years.

Insider ownership<1%
The stake all directors and executive officers hold together, per the 2026 proxy: skin in the game, the first thing Munger reads.
Stock-based compensation$607M
The slice of the business handed to employees in shares this year, 5% of revenue, equal to 27% of operating profit. Buffett's oldest accounting fight: this is compensation, compensation is an expense, real whether or not the headline earnings admit it. One trap: the cash-flow statement adds SBC back, so the operating cash, and the owner earnings drawn from it, are flattered by exactly this amount; counted as the cost it is, what an owner keeps is lower.

Inverting the record

Invert: instead of why eBay Inc. is a good business, the question is what would make owning it a mistake, and whether those marks are in the record. Disconfirming tests across 2016–2025.

2 of the 5 tests turned up something to look into; the other 3 came back clean.

Look hereIs it less profitable than it was?17.1% vs 24.1%
The owner-earnings margin averaged 24.1% early in the record and 17.1% across the last three years, and the latest year has not recovered. Ask the filing whether that is a structural drift or a cyclical trough — price, mix, cost, or a competitor — and whether it is permanent.
Look hereDid reported profit become cash?0.73×
Across the record the business reported $35.3B of net income but generated $25.9B of operating cash, a 0.73-to-one conversion. Profit that does not turn into cash over many years is the classic mark of earnings that are softer than they look. Ask where the gap sits, receivables, inventory, or costs being capitalized rather than expensed.

And these came back clean

Did the share count rise anyway?
Did debt outgrow the business?
Did receivables and inventory outpace sales?

Each test is read from the filings and is noisy alone; a flag can mark a cyclical trough or a year of heavy investment as easily as a problem. The filing says which.

What an owner would ask, FY2025

read the 10-K →

Which reported numbers are a judgment call?
Management names Income taxes as critical estimates
each rests partly on management's judgment; the filing's note sets out the assumptionsverify →

The questions the record and the charts do not answer on their own; each carries the figure and the place to look.

Peers, Commercial Services & Supplies

The same industry, side by side on owner economics. Each figure is a through-cycle median, so a peak or trough year can’t distort it; the group median at the foot is the line to read each against.

Company	Revenue	Gross margin	Op. margin	ROIC	Owner earn. margin
SHOPShopify Inc.	$11.6B	49%	-1.3%	-0%	15%
EBAYeBay Inc.	$11.1B	76%	23.3%	16%	22%
CPAYCorpay Inc.	$4.5B	98%	43.9%	11%	37%
FOURShift4 Payments	$4.2B	23%	1.9%	-1%	9%
CARTMaplebear Inc.	$3.7B	74%	2.4%	21%	18%
MSCIMSCI Inc.	$3.1B	80%	52.3%	38%	46%
ETSYEtsy Inc.	$2.9B	70%	10.5%	24%	26%
ZZillow Group Inc. Class C Capital Stock	$2.6B	78%	-8.9%	-3%	10%
Group median	—	75%	6.5%	14%	20%

The price

What a price has to assume.

What the price implies

reverse-DCF

Type today's close and see the owner-earnings growth you'd have to believe to justify it, beside what eBay Inc. has delivered.

Today’s price $

Through the cycle, eBay Inc. earns about $2.4B on its 21.6% median owner-earnings margin. This year’s 12.9% margin runs below that; the reported figure may understate a lean year. Normalize, below, values the price on that through-cycle figure rather than the latest year.

Base Normalize · through-cycle ($2.4B) Net of stock comp (−$627M)

—

The assumptions Required return 9% Years of high growth 10 Terminal growth 2.5%

9.0% = the 4.55% 10-year Treasury (Jul 15, 2026) + 4.45 points of equity premium. The rate you require is yours to set.

Enter a price above to run it.

Implied by the price—

Owner-earnings growth · ’21→’25−4%/yr

Owner-earnings growth · ’16→’25−4%/yr

Owner-earnings yield—

P/E (3-yr earnings ’23–’25)—

P/B—

Graham’s price gate—

Graham capped the multiple at 15×; Buffett and Munger let that rule go: a wonderful business can deserve 50× if the thesis holds. The gate marks the bargain-hunter's floor.

Against a high-grade bond: Graham’s yardstick bond yield%

Prefilled with the 10-year Treasury (4.55%, as of Jul 15, 2026). Edit it for today’s exact figure, or a AAA corporate yield.

Graham measured a stock against the bond you could own instead, the heart of his margin of safety. Enter a price above to weigh the owner-earnings yield against this bond.

Owner earnings $1.7B on 444M shares outstanding, per the 10-Q cover, as of 2026-04-24; net debt $4.8B. The base is the latest year by default; Normalize values it on the through-cycle median owner-earnings margin (to avoid paying on a peak year). Net of stock comp treats option pay as the expense it is. The dials set the multiple a growth belief justifies; the price, and every dollar on this page, is yours.

Weigh EBAY against another business →

The owners of EBAY: the meeting and the votes →

Cite: Owner Scorecard, "eBay Inc. (EBAY), the owner's record," https://ownerscorecard.com/c/EBAY, data as of 2026-07-09.

Manual order: ← EAT its page in the Manual EBC →

Industry order: ← DVLT the Commercial Services & Supplies chapter EBF →