“Overall, we are pleased with the performance of the portfolio this past quarter,” said eBay Inc. President and CEO John Donahoe. “We took a number of steps during the quarter to further strengthen our business and better align our cost structure to invest and compete. We will continue to stay focused on connecting consumers on our various ecommerce platforms, maintaining financial discipline and capitalizing on new opportunities for growth.”

Read the full press release, the Q3 2008 corporate fact sheet and other related materials at the new eBay Ink news site: http://ebayinkblog.com/news.

To listen to the Q3 2008 Earnings call at 2pm PT this afternoon, please click here.

I will be live-blogging the earnings call for the second consecutive quarter on our Twitter feed at the same time (http://twitter.com/ebayinkblog).

Quarterly Business Highlights:
• eBay Inc. was honored by the White House and U.S. Department of Commerce with the National Medal of Technology for leadership in technology and innovation that has enabled millions of entrepreneurs to participate in the global ecommerce market.
• Marc Andreessen, founder of Netscape, Loudcloud and Ning, joined the eBay Inc. board of directors.
• eBay Inc. repurchased approximately 25 million shares of its outstanding common stock at a cost of approximately $623 million. Since the inception of the stock repurchase program in the third quarter of 2006, the company has repurchased approximately $5.3 billion of its common stock.
• eBay lowered listing fees for the Buy It Now format by more than 70% and extended listing periods to 30 days, up from seven.
• The company’s global classifieds businesses averaged 84 million unique visitors per month during the quarter, representing an increase of 55% year-over-year.
• StubHub entered into a partnership with the NFL’s New York Jets franchise to auction personal seat licenses for the football team’s new stadium.
• PayPal launched merchant services deals with Walmart.com, William Hill (U.K.), Continental Airlines, American Eagle Outfitters, BagsOK (China), newegg (Canada) and OfficeMax, among others.
• Payment volume from PayPal’s merchant services business exceeded the volume received from the eBay marketplace for the first time.
• Skype surpassed 13 million concurrent users at certain peak times.
• Skype-to-Skype minutes reached nearly 16 billion, a 63% increase year over year.

Cheers,
RBH

Read the full press release here: eBay Inc. Reports Second Quarter 2008 Results

To listen to the Q2 2008 Earnings call at 2pm PT this afternoon, please click here. If you’re unable to listen at 2pm but have access to a PC, I’ll be live-blogging via Twitter starting around 2pm: http://twitter.com/ebayinkblog.

Quarterly business highlights (from the press release)
• eBay Inc. repurchased approximately 19 million shares of its outstanding common stock at a cost of approximately $566 million. Since the inception of the share buyback program in the third quarter of 2006, the company has repurchased $4.7 billion of its common stock.
• eBay announced initiatives to enhance the safety and vibrancy of the marketplace including: new rewards and discounts for PowerSellers and expanded protections for customers using PayPal.
• eBay Motors completed agreements to feature certified pre-owned inventory from Chrysler, GM, Lexus and Ford on its showroom hub.
• The company’s global classifieds businesses averaged 81 million unique visitors per month during the quarter, representing and increase of 121% year-over-year.
• StubHub announced a deal making it the official online secondary ticket marketplace for Madonna’s 2008 North America Tour. The company reached a milestone with its 15 millionth ticket sold.
• PayPal Merchant Services signed deals with Delta Airlines, Blockbuster.com, Arcadia Group (U.K.) and William Hill (U.K).
• Skype launched 4.0 in Beta, the largest redesign of the Skype interface since the company’s inception.
• Skype named former Motorola veteran, Scott Durchslag, to the position of chief operating officer overseeing product strategy and marketing.

UPDATE:
Rajiv Dutta is retiring from eBay. Lorrie Norrington to succeed. Full post here

Cheers,
Richard.

Related Reads:
* eBay profits up 22 percent on listing gains
* Skype Annualized Revenues Now Top $500 Million
* Ebay reports 338 million Skype users
* Earnings: eBay Q2 Revs Up 20 Percent; Income Up 22 Percent; Skype Up 51 Percent
* eBay: Q2 Beats Street; Q3 Outlook a Bit Light