Quarter 1, 2009 results

This was the very first time I listened live to the eBay conference call. It was even funny at some moments, see the end of my post.

But, first, let me be very clear: John Donahoe, in the Questions & Answers said very clearly that Skype has no synergies with eBay!

Now the results:
Usernames (not equal to USERS!) grew linearly as in the previous months. I have to admit I am somewhat surprised, because the users online grew better than linear!
The revenue growth quarter to quarter was stronger than the previous one as well in US$ as in €uro! This is good news of course.
On the other hands, the revenue per user name is still going down in US$ and went slightly up in €uro. As I said before, this is a useless metric. It would be better if we could have the revenue per active user! But Skype doesn’t disclose this. The revenue per user name will - in the long run - continue to go down, because of the many "dead user names".
Skype to Skype minutes showed a fairly good but slightly less fast growth, but of course, this is a “no direct revenue generation” metric. There are some indirect effects, like revenue coming from the Skype certified products (even bought by pure “Skype to Skype” users).
SkypeOut minutes showed also and again a good growth, but – alike the Skype to Skype minutes- slightly slower!

Was this a good quarter? Indeed it was! In those economical unstable times, growth is an exception!

What about the expected revenue for 2009 as a whole? Well, i lower my previous estimate of 750 million to only 650 million US$!

And then the funny things, of the Questions & Answers time for the analysts, with only one question allowed:

• John Donahoe begun answering the first question of the first analyst by saying: “congratulations for your new house”! What the heck?????
• And then some moments later it was the other eBay guy (I don’t remember his name, but i think it was the Financial Officer) saying : “let me take your second question of your one allowed question.”

Funny, but at the other hand a pity that they respond to two questions, because it takes away time and therefore the opportunity for some analysts to ask questions. They could be tougher and ignore the second question! Several analysts dared to ask more than one question!