Going to take a chance on eBay. Last week, the global marketplace having a value around $31.5 billion suddenly spiked by nearly 13% upward. An announced partnership with Meta Platforms (META) allowed eBay listings to be featured on Facebook. The news created a bullish gap from $63.17 to $67.90 on eBay charts on January 8, with prices sporadically touching even above $71.50 levels for a little while. Now the dust settled, and a price correction found the stock at nearly $66 per share, providing just a perfect discount to enter the flow of more reasonable and smart buyers at what I call the right timing. eBay gives another chance for still thirsty investors.
We had already discussed great changes on Facebook and Instagram content moderation policy that helped Meta Platform stock itself to rise. And now a supposed rise in popularity of Meta would also support further growth of its collaborating partner. Tests are starting for German, French and, of course, American consumers as they get an option to browse eBay's offerings on Facebook, easily proceeding to eBay for finalizing purchases. I feel here is not so important that the management of Meta decided to do this soon after the European Commission recently imposed a big $840 million fine on Meta for practices allegedly favouring its very own Facebook marketplace. Meta has reportedly appealed the EC decision, but it also took this step to integrate with eBay in order to address the concerns raised. First, this may commercially support additional sales to eBay, but also deliver more of eBay sellers to access a larger Facebook audience. The visibility of eBay listings would clearly be higher, as well as users' engagement, and so I hopefully add some of eBay shares to my already vast Meta stake.
Beside a 63% stock return on eBay over the past year, signing of a definitive agreement for eBay to acquire Caramel, which is a provider of an end-to-end online car sales platform, just happened in the shortest possible time. This acquisition deal was announced to be fully finished before the end of Q1 2025. Actually, the motors division on eBay is now a hub for auto parts and accessories enthusiasts but Caramel's advanced technology solves many complex problems during vehicle sales in a better way, including all automatized paperwork, ownership transfer, financial matters, and thus each and every detail up to transportation. Comfortably streamlining the whole process of buying and selling vehicles on a safe and always crowded platform is yet an additional solid argument for eBay stock growth.
