GameStop Offers to Buy eBay for $56 Billion (cnbc.com) 96
GameStop has made an unsolicited $56 billion cash-and-stock offer to buy eBay (paywalled; alternative source), with CEO Ryan Cohen arguing he can turn the marketplace into a far larger Amazon competitor. "EBay should be worth -- and will be worth -- a lot more money," Cohen said in an interview. "I'm thinking about turning eBay into something worth hundreds of billions of dollars." The Wall Street Journal reports: Cohen said GameStop has a commitment letter from TD Bank to provide up to $20 billion in debt financing to help make a deal possible. GameStop delivered an offer letter to eBay on Sunday and released a copy of it following the Journal's report on the details of the bid. Cohen wrote in the letter to eBay Chairman Paul Pressler that GameStop started building its eBay position on Feb. 4. It said its offer consists of 50% cash and 50% GameStop shares.
EBay said Monday morning its board and financial advisers would review GameStop's unsolicited proposal. It said there were no discussions with or outreach from GameStop before receiving the offer. Ebay added that it will review the offer "with a focus on the value to be delivered to eBay shareholders, including the value of the GameStop stock consideration and the ability of GameStop to deliver a binding, actionable proposal."
If eBay isn't receptive, Cohen said he was prepared to run a proxy fight and take the offer directly to its shareholders. The window for shareholders to nominate director candidates at eBay ahead of an annual meeting scheduled for this June has already closed, according to the company's proxy materials. Cohen told the Journal that putting his videogame retailer and eBay under one roof could create opportunities to cut costs and improve earnings. The two companies have some overlap already, including a focus on selling collectibles such as trading cards. "There is nobody who is more qualified, based on my experience, to run the eBay business," Cohen said, referencing his time at GameStop and previously Chewy, the online pet-products marketplace he co-founded.
EBay said Monday morning its board and financial advisers would review GameStop's unsolicited proposal. It said there were no discussions with or outreach from GameStop before receiving the offer. Ebay added that it will review the offer "with a focus on the value to be delivered to eBay shareholders, including the value of the GameStop stock consideration and the ability of GameStop to deliver a binding, actionable proposal."
If eBay isn't receptive, Cohen said he was prepared to run a proxy fight and take the offer directly to its shareholders. The window for shareholders to nominate director candidates at eBay ahead of an annual meeting scheduled for this June has already closed, according to the company's proxy materials. Cohen told the Journal that putting his videogame retailer and eBay under one roof could create opportunities to cut costs and improve earnings. The two companies have some overlap already, including a focus on selling collectibles such as trading cards. "There is nobody who is more qualified, based on my experience, to run the eBay business," Cohen said, referencing his time at GameStop and previously Chewy, the online pet-products marketplace he co-founded.
Where the other $36bn come from? (Score:5, Interesting)
Gamestop has a market cap of $11bn and cash on hand of $9bn. Who would lend these lunatics $36bn?
That said someone did lend Musk $44bn for the dumbest purchase ever so I guess someone out there will float the cash Gamestop wants to spend.
Re:Where the other $36bn come from? (Score:4, Interesting)
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Riding their own status as a meme stock, I'm guessing.
Re:Where the other $36bn come from? (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: Where the other $36bn come from? (Score:1)
They can double their market cap by issuing new stock that reflects the increased value of GameStop & eBay. In effect, eBay's current share holders collectively will still hold shares equal to about half the sale price of eBay.
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There's people who don't trade stocks, and people who shouldn't trade stocks. The kind of person who thinks you magically generate market cap by issuing more stock definitely falls in the latter.
Please understand the instrument you're investing in before you blow your retirement savings.
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Riding their own status as a meme stock, I'm guessing.
You guessed right, they literally already have claimed they can just issue new stock when asked where they'd get the money.
However, they haven't raised that capital yet. I don't think they can actually (legally) make the offer without some sort of financing commitment.
My unqualified prediction: They will be denied the right to make the offer, they will lose money on legal expenses for having tried, and their moronic hillbilly wannaba dude-bro investors will reward them for having tried.
Re:Where the other $36bn come from? (Score:5, Interesting)
Has to be some kind of leveraged buyout where the insane valuation of the company they are buying based on the insane valuation of their own company is supposed to produce magic value and a more insane combined valuation from which they will "easily" pay off all the borrowed money that lubricated the rest of the deal. Usually has some vulture elements of splitting up and selling pieces that have insane projections of future sales.
Too bad such insanity isn't illegal.
My solution delusion would be pro-freedom anti-greedom taxation where such deals would basically become poisonous. The merger would result in higher taxes on the profits for the monopoly-building aspects, thus lowering the precious retaining earnings after taxes. Create a natural path to higher retained earnings by spawning competing child companies... "Can't get there from here."
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NAK
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They stated in TFS how they are proposing to buy it.
Liar liar, pants on fire!
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That's how Eddie Lampert bought KMart and Sears.
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On the one hand, I mostly agree with your analysis.
On the other hand, they reportedly have $20b in financing lined up, which is more than the remaining $16b they'd need to find.
So I can easily imagine legally-permissible insanity filling the gap. Though that isn't my prediction of how this ends.
The most insane part in my opinion is their claim that an established brand doesn't need to spend any money on marketing and they can just cut marketing and coast to increased profits. It sounds a lot like squanderin
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I didn't go into the details of the deal because I admit I'm not that interested in more sordid stuff that is still under development. Usually takes a while for all the details to come out, which actually works well for books. Currently reading Chaos Monkeys which is largely about the financial shenanigans of Twitter and Facebook. But mostly the author is making himself look bad...
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Who would lend these lunatics $36bn?
Well, lunatics that trust AI to help them make their investment decisions, of course!
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Who would lend these lunatics $36bn?
From TFS:
Cohen said GameStop has a commitment letter from TD Bank to provide up to $20 billion in debt financing to help make a deal possible.
I guess this guy is either hoping for, or actually has other investors ready to provide the other U$D 16 milliard. Probably, those investors will come forward once the deal clears some other hurdles.
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So you're trying to convince the good people (sic) of Slashdot that you believe $20b and $36b to be equal?
They need the numbers to work before the ebay investors are tasked with voting on the deal; not after.
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The usual trick is, that they can get the money lent not for what they are worth themselves now, but what they will be worth when having bought eBay. If they cannot pay back, the bank gets GameStop *and* eBay, which are together worth 54 Billion.
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they can get the money lent not for what they are worth themselves now, but what they will be worth when
Yeah but they gotta do it first, before the offer can be presented to ebay shareholders. Otherwise ebay's board tells them to kick rocks. They can't force a vote with a handful of wishes, they can only promise what they actually have to offer.
I highly doubt any bank is gonna offer them $16b in hopes and wishes. If a bank does so and ends up with both, they still lost $16b. That's actually a noticeable amount of money, even to a bank.
Re: Where the other $36bn come from? (Score:2)
CEO Ryan Cohen couldn't answer the question [pcgamer.com] on CNBC either. He was just stuck in a loop, like a stoner forgetting his McDonald's order parked in the drive thru.
Re: Where the other $36bn come from? (Score:1)
The Fine Summary says the offer of $56BN is half cash, half stock - that means $28BN is stock in the company they just sold.
So then we need to find $28BN in cash - as TFS mentions, TD Bank has guaranteed a $20BN loan, so that leaves $8BN that needs to be found - GameStop apparently has about $9BN in cash and cash equivalent. [macrotrends.net]
So there you go, that's how GameStop can buy eBay.
Ebay + Retail = Win (Score:1)
News to me (Score:5, Insightful)
Gamestop still exists? How?
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Here we go again (Score:5, Insightful)
GameStop is (was) a meme stock, whose value got inflated due to social media trends. I'm guessing this Ryan fellow doesn't see a big upside to the GameStop business plan or revenue possibilities, and he thinks that a splashy move like this could start the memes rolling again.
To me as an eBay customer, this doesn 't sound good. I detect the wafting aroma of enshiatification.
Re:Here we go again (Score:5, Interesting)
It could be freakin great though, if they adopted a bit of the Amazon logistics soup recipe. They have shitloads of pickup locations scattered about already.
It would be sweet if I could buy from eBay and go pick it up at a local GameStop for free / reduced price instead of paying to wait 3 weeks for the slowest media mail on the planet because the buyer wanted to use the shipping money as extra profit.
Re:Here we go again (Score:5, Informative)
If I could instead take it to an eBay store front, maybe someone will buy it locally, but if not, they can handle packaging and shipping off to someone else and take a cut of the profits. Might make me consider eBay again.
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If I could instead take it to an eBay store front, maybe someone will buy it locally, but if not, they can handle packaging and shipping off to someone else and take a cut of the profits. Might make me consider eBay again.
You're basically describing a consignment shop.
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You're basically describing a consignment shop.
That's what eBay is...except sometimes with auctions...and sometimes the items are new...and sometimes the items are stolen (I guess this last one is true of both consignment shops and eBay).
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No, ebay is dispute resolution.
Are there abusive buyers that some sellers have a legit gripe with? Yes. But is that what holds back used sales? Is there a big backlog of valuable vintage goods that aren't offered on the market because of fraudulent buyers? I'm gonna call bullshit on that, estate sales will move forwards regardless of current market value.
The actual thing holding back the market is the opposite; abusive sellers. "Mint" condition that is actually garbage. Trust in ebay's dispute resolution va
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Are there abusive buyers that some sellers have a legit gripe with? Yes. But is that what holds back used sales?
Well, my personal experience, in 2025 100% of my buyers were abusive buyers. I don't sell very often, but 0 for 3 in 2025...I won't sell again with eBay. And if I close my account, I'm less likely to buy from them, too. Repeat that over and over again, and suddenly eBay has a much smaller market. For big $$ items, it's Facebook marketplace and I meet the buyer in person. For other items, many of which could have value at a place like eBay, it's Goodwill or the trash, because it's too much trouble and gettin
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I've spent a few thousand on ebay in the past year, probably 30 items purchased, and the only item I had a problem with was a $10 used chisel that had a slight unreported bend in it.
You do have to carefully evaluate sellers and look at the listings with a skeptical eye, there's lots of things that I wanted to buy but didn't because I didn't trust it. 99% positive feedback might sound good, but it's actually horrible.
A couple years ago I bought a bunch of used vinyl albums and I had better results with ebay
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And yet, it's the go-to place for vintage tool collectors. Many of the items are rather expensive. And the camera and gear market is also very active with a lot of valuable items.
You were "0 for 3" but there may be more to the story. Perhaps you were inexperienced with the items you were selling and you genuinely mislabeled the condition. Or you thought it was ok to just take pictures of the good angles and not the problem. Or you were selling something weird, like the other guy complaining that software wa
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Or you thought it was ok to just take pictures of the good angles and not the problem. Or you were selling something weird, like the other guy complaining that software was opened and returned.
It was cast iron components (such as griddle, pot holders, etc.) from a gas stove that we shipped off. The parts were still worth good money and were in used but perfectly workable condition.
And how do you get "ripped off?" The actual problem with an abusive buyer is they make an unreasonable demand and threaten you with a bad review. That's what the dispute resolution is for.
I'm out the money for the sale, the shipping, and the eBay fees. It cost me more than just throwing those items in the trash. I don't get why dispute resolution would be of any use. I have pictures of the working cast iron items, they have pictures of broken ones they claim broke during shipping. Really? Cast iron, trip
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and who is left?
Apparently the good buyers and sellers, which is why so many people have a positive view of it and it is a thriving business even with a lot of competition.
It sounds like you wanted to "round up" on your descriptions. Again, I've only heard your side of the story. And you don't sound like you have a legitimate grievance. You sound like you overcharged and the item was returned. All they get is their money back, and they're returning the item. They don't gain anything. Charging a boatload of money for ship
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It sounds like you wanted to "round up" on your descriptions. Again, I've only heard your side of the story. And you don't sound like you have a legitimate grievance.
I'm not asking you to negotiate my grievance. I shipped nearly unbreakable cast iron oven components (matched with the OEM numbers stamped on them, so no lack of clarity about what was being sold), double-wrapped in bubble wrap, in a heavy box, all wrapped in tape. And the buyer claims the cast iron components were broken, snapped into bits. I suppose it is possible it could have been broken during the shipping, but the amount of force that would take is quite considerable and unlikely given that the box it
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It would be sweet if I could buy from eBay and go pick it up at a local GameStop for free / reduced price instead of paying to wait 3 weeks for the slowest media mail on the planet because the buyer wanted to use the shipping money as extra profit.
That'd only work if you were buying products where GameStop is the seller. Plenty of other online marketplaces already do the whole ship-to-store-from-3rd-party-seller thing (Walmart and Home Depot immediately come to mind) and it's neither faster nor more convenient than having the order shipped directly to your home.
GameStop brings nothing good to the table by buying eBay - they'll likely enshittify it further with stupid crypto schemes, AI shopping agents, or other various crap no one asked for.
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TBH, I have long been using eBay as an Amazon alternative.
Gamestops are the size of a large walkin closet (Score:2)
It could be freakin great though, if they adopted a bit of the Amazon logistics soup recipe. They have shitloads of pickup locations scattered about already.
/p>
Have you seen the size of a Gamestop? They're tiny and cramped, and don't exactly scream "large amount of extra storage space"
Re:Here we go again (Score:5, Insightful)
This is like when K-Mart (which was failing) bought Sears (which was not failing) and then they both went down.
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Both of those examples are of equity manipulation: make the companies assume debt and hollow out their core business, and sell their real assets to another company for cheap.
That's not what's happening here, particularly since GameStop is doing well and paypal is increasingly enshitified with scam posts and bad policies which screw sellers when a buyer wants to make a fraudulent claim. I lost thousands due to the latter and have heard of many people recently swindled by the former.
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Wait, you're one of the scam sellers that ebay protected people from?! See, this is why I trust ebay, and why if they were under new management they'd have to win my trust all over again!
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I realize you're likely being sarcastic, but ... No, I (years ago) was selling as-is used equipment (orinoco pcmcia 801.11 cards) and other similar things I was picking up at auction. Circa 2015-2017 timeframe. In the course of a couple years I went from mostly good sales and things being equitable, to increasingly frequent "damaged" or "not delivered" (even with tracking) claims by the buyers. Materials were always sold as-is and untested (or tested and stated as such) and it was rare for anyone to actuall
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Materials were always sold as-is and untested (or tested and stated as such) and it was rare for anyone to actually want to address the issue and get a return
Are there abusive buyers? Yes, but very few. This is apparent to anybody who reads a seller's negative feedback before buying anything.
However, there are many more abusive sellers than abusive buyers. And you sound like one of them, based on your own version of events. Presumably it was actually the negative feedback dragging your rating down that caused you to be "losing money." It's hard to lose money though, normally you'd merely not make enough.
I don't think used computers or software is actually even a
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That would be good analogy except that Sears was actually also failing.
I loved Sears, and I miss them. After Wards closed they were my go-to. However, the last few times I shopped there I did notice that parking was especially easy, and the store was not at all crowded. Both of which seemed convenient at the time, but less so in retrospect.
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You got it backwards. It was an undervalued, heavily shorted stock (still is) for a viable company that was doing well, financially, and people figured out that the people doing the shorts were intentionally bankrupting companies for profit. So they decided to do something about it, and maintain the stock value.
As for enshitification on Ebay... go try to buy a "big ticket" item on Ebay like a video card or Mac, half to 9/10 of all listings are "great" deals - from new accounts with anywhere from 0 sales to
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Indeed. I don't even know why I bother, half the people on here have never touched a girl.
Time travel back to April Fool's Day? (Score:2)
Re: Time travel back to April Fool's Day? (Score:2)
But... (Score:5, Funny)
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The rules are made up and points don't matter. (Score:3)
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Meme stock -> meme economy -> meme civilization -> meme species.
I'm going to wait for Meme Civ IV.
The subsequent ones will be terribad.
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I don't understand your point. Are you saying we are a post-scarcity society, or that we're not?
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There is some logic to this (Score:5, Interesting)
Gamestop made a business model of taking used products and selling them on. Unlike the storefronts that tried to make a living by helping people sell on eBay, Gamestop already has those locations in place, with a compatible business. Adding grading and verification, and maybe even packaging and shipping makes sense. How many more people would sell their unwanted items if all they had to do was drop them off and someone else handles the listing, selling, packaging and shipping.
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Gamestop already has those locations in place
Do they? Every single GameStop location near me in Southern California has closed.
Re: There is some logic to this (Score:2)
Might just be your neighborhood. There are still plenty in the LA area. In my state, about a third of the locations have closed in the past decade. However there are still several within a reasonable drive.
I would be interested to see if there is a nexus between GameStop locations that have closed and check cashing stores. Iâ(TM)m not implying a positive or negative correlation. Just curious if there is a correlation.
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eBay started offering to ship stuff for sellers recently. You buy the shipping from them, and drop the package off at some local collection point.
If it gets damaged during shipping, it's eBay's problem. They refund the buyer, and you keep the money from the sale too. I guess they claim from the courier (Evri in the UK), but obviously are reliant on the buyer to send photos showing a damaged package. I imagine very few take photos before ripping it open.
I'm pretty sure some people just sell broken stuff and
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How many more people would sell their unwanted items if all they had to do was drop them off and someone else handles the listing, selling, packaging and shipping.
Generally the reason people sell on eBay instead of letting someone else handle the listing, selling, packaging and shipping is because you can keep more profit for yourself. GameStop isn't anywhere close to being a monopoly on turning your used crap into cash, and often their offers (unless you're interested in store credit, which made more sense back in the days before Steam was a thing) aren't much better than what you'd get from a pawn shop.
Come to think of it, GameStop should just rebrand as PawnStop,
Oh good (Score:2)
Ebay has already enshittified with their “live” influencer auctions and relaxing the accuracy of the search results. It used to be you entered a part number and received exact results. Now it’s all related part numbers like google. They do respect wrapping in quotes for now at least.
Time to buy Game Stop stock (Score:2)
Almost a Dupe (Score:5, Informative)
GameStop is preparing an offer for eBay [slashdot.org] is from two days ago, and some of the comments there were actually appropriate.
(posted by an A/C)
It's a scam (Score:2)
Our entire economy is a grift now. I'm sure that's fine though.
Ebay is going nowhere (Score:2, Insightful)
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It's fascinating how Ebay is still solvent, having done nothing of meaning for close to 20 years with basically only a slight UI uplift in the past 15. They seem to thrive primarily on the backs of people getting scammed - either sellers being scammed by buyers, or fraudsters relying on what little exists of Ebay's reputation to get a quick fraud sale.
Reminds me of when AOL bought Time Warner (Score:2)
Time Warner had (and has) an enduring business model; AOL was the meme stock of its day.
Sure... (Score:2)
Gamestop bought thinkgeek in 2014 for 140M and basically let it all wither away. They'd certainly be looking for something else to diversify and try to survive, because if they don't there's no way but down. Can't blame them for wanting to acquire something with an actual viable business model.
Of course whether any
sear clone (Score:3)
Cohen is a trainwreck (Score:3, Informative)
CNBC Interview with Ryan Cohen this morning.
Either he did this interview after an all-night Hunter Biden-esque binge of crack and hookers or he is a complete moron. Entirely incapable of understanding or answering obvious and basic questions. Watch and make your own judgement.
https://youtu.be/Bmj2PaxX24E?s... [youtu.be]
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That's pretty crazy. 100% US Grade A clown-world right there.
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Or to be more contemporary, Kash Patel or Hegseth's alcoholic impaired on the job performance occurring right now as I type this?
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CNBC Interview with Ryan Cohen this morning.
Either he did this interview after an all-night Hunter Biden-esque binge of crack and hookers or he is a complete moron. Entirely incapable of understanding or answering obvious and basic questions. Watch and make your own judgement.
https://youtu.be/Bmj2PaxX24E?s... [youtu.be]
Yeah, that was a train wreck. Dude looks out of his tree...
That said, what puzzles me most about that interview was the financial breakdown by the host (to paraphrase): "Your market cap is ~$11 billion, you've got ~$9 billion on your balance sheet ... you provide all your stock, and then your cash, that gets you to $20 billion..."
Um, what?
You can't just add those numbers together to get the net value of the company (or the sum value of its assets, including goodwill, expected future earnings, etc.). They re
eBay would have to be stupid to accept this (Score:2)
What you have is Gamestop, a failing business caused by people not buying retail when they can order online, or streaming for games. Any shareholders or executives at eBay would have to be an idiot to accept the offer. Gamestop should go for other businesses that are having problems, so would be happy for the chance of a buyout or merger before they are forced to liquidate the business.
eBay is Now eStop! (Score:2)
Welcome to the all-new eStop! We know you have concerns, so let us put them to rest straight away.
The site will not change. We respect the investment you've made in learning and navigating the site. However, if you're feeling curious or adventurous, feel free to check out our [new site design prototype]. (This design will become the default landing page in mid-2027; the old site UI will enter maintenance mode for only the most critical bugs.)
To thwart LLMs and other bots, new default limits on biddi
Why? Greed, aka 'Incentives'? (Score:2)
Granted, eBay can be horrible. But .. Gamestop? Overreach. Why? Greed, aka 'Incentives'?
Gamestop's CEO is Canadian. TB Bank is also Canadian. From the CEO's Wikipedia page:
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In January 2026, the board granted him a 100% performance-based stock option award valued by press reports at approximately $35 billion if fully earned, covering 171.5 million shares at $20.66 per share. The award is divided into nine tranches that vest only if GameStop simultaneously hits market-capitalization and cumulative-EB
Financialization funny money bubble (Score:2)
meh (Score:2)
Makes sense, Gamestop became a weird used goods store a while ago.
This might just be to get them to the table. (Score:2)
It WAS a meme stock. They really turned around turning themselves around after cutting costs and changing their main focus to collectibles. As for the buyout, I am thinking its more of a way to get eBay to sit down to a partnership or even a merger. I mean think about it. They are the first place you go to sell your games or used consoles. They have systems in place that calculate how valuable many of their items are.
You could even have them be a cosigner that handles the posting and shipping of your s