Stripe wants to buy PayPal. The company that redefined online payments roughly a decade after PayPal invented them offered $60.50 a share - a $53 billion bid for a company that was worth nearly $360 billion in July 2021.
PayPal’s board rejected it as “inadequate” and is pushing for closer to $70. The stock surged 17% on the news and settled around $58. Goldman Sachs and Evercore are advising on options.
The case for selling: revenue growth has slowed to 4-5%, branded checkout is losing ground to Apple Pay, and the company is on its third CEO since 2023. The case for holding: PayPal still processes $1.8 trillion a year, Venmo has over 100 million users barely being monetized, and the stock trades at just ~11x trailing earnings.
Five years ago PayPal was worth more than Goldman Sachs. Now Goldman is advising whether to sell it for a seventh of the price.
Here's how the community voted
Stripe and Advent are bidding $53 billion for a company worth nearly $360 billion five years ago. The board rejected the offer as “inadequate” and is pushing for closer to $70 - Goldman Sachs and Evercore are advising. Michael Burry estimates intrinsic value between $75 and $115, with a preferred estimate near $100, and says he’s not selling.
PayPal still processes $1.8 trillion in annual payment volume across roughly 26 billion transactions. Venmo has over 100 million users with revenue growing 20%, but still accounts for only about 5% of PayPal’s total - a massive monetization runway that Stripe would inherit alongside 439 million consumer accounts it currently lacks.
At ~11x trailing earnings and 1.3x sales, PayPal trades at a fraction of its 10-year median valuation. Free cash flow hit $1.78 billion last quarter alone, up 157%. The company has bought back 13% of its shares in two years and just initiated its first-ever dividend.
Revenue growth collapsed from 21% in 2020 to 5% today. Branded checkout - PayPal’s highest-margin product - grew just 1% in Q4 2025, and Apple Pay’s US online volume has reportedly surpassed it. The company is on its third CEO since 2023 after Alex Chriss was forced out in February.
The deal may not close. A combined Stripe-PayPal would control roughly 65% of global online payment processing. The DOJ sued to block Visa’s $5.3 billion acquisition of Plaid at a similar concentration level, and Visa withdrew. Regulatory review would take 18-24 months, and prediction markets give only a 30% chance of closing in 2026.
If the deal falls apart, the stock likely drops back toward its pre-bid price of $47 or below. Active accounts are flat at 439 million, digital wallet share has fallen from 90% to 40% in under a decade, and operating margins are contracting despite cutting 20% of the workforce. Stripe itself now processes more payment volume than PayPal does.
Stripe and Advent are bidding $53 billion for a company worth nearly $360 billion five years ago. The board rejected the offer as “inadequate” and is pushing for closer to $70 - Goldman Sachs and Evercore are advising. Michael Burry estimates intrinsic value between $75 and $115, with a preferred estimate near $100, and says he’s not selling.
PayPal still processes $1.8 trillion in annual payment volume across roughly 26 billion transactions. Venmo has over 100 million users with revenue growing 20%, but still accounts for only about 5% of PayPal’s total - a massive monetization runway that Stripe would inherit alongside 439 million consumer accounts it currently lacks.
At ~11x trailing earnings and 1.3x sales, PayPal trades at a fraction of its 10-year median valuation. Free cash flow hit $1.78 billion last quarter alone, up 157%. The company has bought back 13% of its shares in two years and just initiated its first-ever dividend.
Revenue growth collapsed from 21% in 2020 to 5% today. Branded checkout - PayPal’s highest-margin product - grew just 1% in Q4 2025, and Apple Pay’s US online volume has reportedly surpassed it. The company is on its third CEO since 2023 after Alex Chriss was forced out in February.
The deal may not close. A combined Stripe-PayPal would control roughly 65% of global online payment processing. The DOJ sued to block Visa’s $5.3 billion acquisition of Plaid at a similar concentration level, and Visa withdrew. Regulatory review would take 18-24 months, and prediction markets give only a 30% chance of closing in 2026.
If the deal falls apart, the stock likely drops back toward its pre-bid price of $47 or below. Active accounts are flat at 439 million, digital wallet share has fallen from 90% to 40% in under a decade, and operating margins are contracting despite cutting 20% of the workforce. Stripe itself now processes more payment volume than PayPal does.
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