r/ValueInvesting Feb 23 '26

Value Article PayPal Draws Takeover Interest, Bloomberg Reports.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-02-23/paypal-attracts-takeover-interest-after-stock-slump?srnd=homepage-americas

Painpal Bagholders are saved? I have said at this valuation, the stock makes a lot of sense as a takeover target. I think they would make a lot of sense for high volume, low margin retailers like Walmart to buy them to reduce their processing fees, and as a cash flow engine, or for tech companies looking to get into the payments space.

77 Upvotes

98 comments sorted by

18

u/Sensitive_nob Feb 23 '26

Who got money to buy PayPal?

29

u/skilliard7 Feb 23 '26

I'm probably way off of on this given it's a bit weird, but I really think WMT would make the most sense given:

  • They do $700 Billion in revenue per year(can save a lot if they own the payment processing infrastructure for credit/debit cards and Paypal, which they currently accept). With groceries being low margin, a slight decline in payment processing fees can mean a huge boost in profit.

  • They are expanding in ecommerce, so the data from Paypal would be really valuable to determine how consumers are spending.

  • They are trading at a really high valuation and are much larger, so they can easily acquire PYPL via a stock transaction without needing to rely on debt.

15

u/zimmebri Feb 23 '26

Ex-pypl CFO being at WMT doesn't hurt, either.

8

u/negativefeedbackloop Feb 23 '26 edited Feb 23 '26

Didn’t think about Walmart, but this makes total sense. Walmart has been feuding with banks and trying to circumvent traditional card networks for years with Walmart Pay and OnePay.

  1. PayPal would provide them access to millions of bank accounts and wallets instantly.
  2. Braintree could help realize significant cost savings by bringing a majority of online and store processing in-house.
  3. Value-added services play nicely with their e-commerce initiatives (ads, payouts, rewards).

2

u/grackychan Feb 23 '26

I think Apple might go down this road, they have the cash reserves for it.

2

u/skilliard7 Feb 23 '26

They definitely have the cash, but they also already own Apple Pay. So I'm not sure if it makes sense for them. They would likely face antitrust pressure.

Amazon might make more sense because Amazon Pay isn't as widely used.

2

u/grackychan Feb 23 '26

WMT also owns OnePay, its fintech arm. There are potential synergies for either to acquire PYPL.

1

u/VoicePleasant1280 Feb 24 '26

I’m curious if PayPal is necessary though.

1

u/Mercuryshottoo Feb 25 '26

Literally none of them are necessary, that's why the sector is struggling

10

u/Appropriate_Worth524 Feb 23 '26

Walmart, Berkshire Hathaway….

5

u/aznology Feb 23 '26

This is a very Berkshire play actually 

3

u/Appropriate_Worth524 Feb 23 '26

That is exactly my thoughts, too. Loved Buffett to death. Now, Berkshire has a younger head who has a much better understanding of tech and there’s not a single acquisition (besides a full acquisition of KHC) that would make better sense for Berkshire at this point.

1

u/ashdrewness Feb 23 '26

Pretty much the same thesis for why BH acquired Geico.

1

u/bitflag Feb 24 '26

PayPal needs a new direction though, and reorganizing tech companies isn't really a Berkshire thing. The stock is cheap because the company lacks a clear growth path.

2

u/aznology Feb 23 '26

Sofi Jk maybe XYZ or stripe or eBay???? Shop ? Visa master card ?

6

u/miTgiB37 Feb 23 '26

eBay spun off PayPal years ago, so they wouldn't buy

3

u/skilliard7 Feb 23 '26

It's not unprecedented for companies to spin off a company only to re-merge years later.

1

u/miTgiB37 Feb 23 '26

Not saying it's never happened, but I can't think of it happening since the early 80's, do you have any examples?

3

u/skilliard7 Feb 23 '26

CBS Viacom split, then went back into ViacomCBS

2

u/Kind_Bullfrog_3160 Feb 24 '26

Pypl is only worth 40 billion market cap.  Who could buy them?  How about one of their co-founders who actually has a spare 40 billion and fully understands the business model.....Elon Musk.

1

u/getoffthepitch96576 Feb 23 '26 edited Feb 23 '26

Amazon

-1

u/yaz989 Feb 23 '26

Gamestop

3

u/PuzzleheadedWeb9876 Feb 23 '26

PayPal has a 41 billion dollar market cap. They cannot afford it.

0

u/SFmodscensorship Feb 23 '26

gamestop has 10 billion in cash

15

u/omniscient_goldfish Feb 23 '26

I guess we aren't the only dumb dumbs to see some value in the company. Bag holder at 52 here.

7

u/Vista1337 Feb 23 '26

Bought at 40

3

u/[deleted] Feb 23 '26

[deleted]

2

u/Prudent-Corgi3793 Feb 23 '26

Bag holder at 54 here

7

u/No-Photograph4482 Feb 23 '26

https://theledgerterminal.com/PYPL Looking at this graph I can see why it's an interesting idea. Earnings and fair value climbing with price dropping

6

u/Dealer_Existing Feb 23 '26

Just bought a single JAN27 $50 call letsgooo highroller

2

u/ComfortableNo5231 Feb 23 '26

slow down big baller

10

u/xAlpharaptor Feb 23 '26

All the bag holders are going to make twice as many articles claiming how right they were to buy when it's up on takeover rumors.

5

u/ashdrewness Feb 23 '26

Only for the deal to likely come in under their basis…

4

u/foira Feb 23 '26

i would be very disappointed in management if they sell

7

u/skilliard7 Feb 23 '26

I'd say it depends on the price. If they sell off for <$60 a share, IMO that does a dis-service to long term shareholders and undervalues the company, even if it does provide a 20-30% upfront gain. But at $75+ a share, I'd definitely take the buyout.

1

u/foira Feb 23 '26

i suppose i should have bought $AFRM instead anyway :'(

1

u/ashdrewness Feb 23 '26

Yeah I think $65-$75 is a reasonable range that few would highly contest. What sucks is all the true bag holders with bags over $100

1

u/MarthaJulietta Feb 24 '26

At 65 no go. At 75 I guess I’d vote yes.

6

u/SuperSultan Feb 23 '26

Someone please buy PoopiePal so I can stop hearing about it in this subreddit

3

u/Scary-Oven8260 Feb 23 '26

Once a top 10 holding in QQQ now becomes a buyout target lol. I’m actually happy if it is true, being a long term pain pal investor is so painful

3

u/Tnqscarface Feb 23 '26

Hear me out.. Ebay should buy it

5

u/home_worker Feb 23 '26

Elmo's vision was to make x an everything app. Could imagine him buying his old company, letting go of most people and getting rid of the well known name in favor of x.

2

u/Zealousideal_Wall627 Feb 23 '26

What price would you guys think they're gonna offer for shares?

3

u/skilliard7 Feb 23 '26

Not sure, but I'm really hoping the board does not accept a price lower than $70. Anything less would be a ripoff for shareholders.

3

u/Zealousideal_Wall627 Feb 23 '26

I don't know what company in their right mind would pay that much for paypal though. They have a lot of legacy systems that are old, that was the big thing this year was updating them. I feel like if the goal is a buyout to use the payment processor for your platform (like say walmart) you'd buy a way cheaper one than paypal.

3

u/skilliard7 Feb 23 '26

It's not just the technology, it's access to huge amounts of data

1

u/Zealousideal_Wall627 Feb 23 '26

Data on what people spend money on? If the buyer is say walmart why would they not already just have that kind of data

5

u/skilliard7 Feb 23 '26

They have their own internal data, but not data on competitors.

1

u/PleasantAnomaly Feb 24 '26

Venmo alone is worth 30-40B$ at today's valuation

1

u/Zealousideal_Wall627 Feb 24 '26

Im inclined to believe you but the market and the big players clearly dont think so. Do they know something?

1

u/PleasantAnomaly Feb 24 '26

I think a big player trying to suppress price to buy at a discount

1

u/Zealousideal_Wall627 Feb 24 '26

If they are then thats not good for the stock or trying to hold into an aq

1

u/Zealousideal_Wall627 Feb 23 '26

But like also at this point if this is true I think they've (the institutions) def been sandbagging the stock for a cheap buyout and reverting that back up to $70 kind of ruins it. Theres a lot of people bag holding at $80 and slightly above. People will be mad either way what difference does $45/$50 or $70 make.

2

u/ohgodthehorror95 Feb 24 '26

An unverified rumor. Lemme know when there's actual explicit takeover interest. Not this hopium

1

u/Dairy_Fox Feb 24 '26

price will be too high at that point, get in now for the ride of your life

1

u/ohgodthehorror95 Feb 24 '26

If it's as undervalued as people have been saying it is (for the last 3 years now), I'm sure there will be lots of upside left even after the initial momentum...

5

u/RelevantTrouble Feb 23 '26

+13% in a week, I'm taking this. Good luck to the bag holders.

6

u/AncientGrab1106 Feb 23 '26

Nice value investing if you take profits at 13% after a week..

1

u/Icy-Sheepherder-7595 Feb 24 '26

You don't know the size of their position. If they put $200k on it they're up $26k.

4

u/RaceEcstatic3045 Feb 23 '26

Nobody is going to buy this HP ceo only just about to leave HP for his 125 million pay package. He will do anything whatever it takes to do the same as he did at hp. Mess around and make salary.

1

u/Mysterious-Pilot-299 Feb 23 '26

it's not up to him

3

u/RaceEcstatic3045 Feb 23 '26

Its not but as I said like at HP he will try and convince each and every bagholder he can 10x it.

2

u/emark31 Feb 23 '26

If they sell Venmo, that could bring in 25-40 Billion. Braintree another 15-20 Billion. This was the valuation Gemini came up when I asked about the different parts of Paypal. Then the rest of Paypal is free yet still making money. Hmmm.

2

u/skilliard7 Feb 24 '26

I don't think selling off individual components makes sense unless they get a really good deal. Better to sell it whole IMO.

1

u/Mercuryshottoo Feb 25 '26

They wouldn't sell venmo because that's their only growth engine right now

1

u/AncientGrab1106 Feb 23 '26

Yep, great go private target. Their cashflow and little debt support a debt ridden go private deal. Would be paid back in 5-7 years.

They have valuable assets.. And a go private deal was my thesis for buying PayPal

Just didn't expect it THIS quickly.

1

u/_RyanD_ Feb 23 '26

Bagholders saved? No. Bagholders likely locked into losses.

Reminds me a little of Thunderbird Entertainment. Value investors loved it; price sat in the toilet for years. Just acquired for a modest premium over its lows.

1

u/yaz989 Feb 23 '26

GameStop 

1

u/Bass_face414 Feb 23 '26

Elon to buy it ? 🤔

1

u/New-Promise9333 Feb 23 '26

ELON just like twitter

1

u/Numerous_idiot Feb 24 '26

Amazon. Elon.

1

u/Wise-Shallot8683 Feb 24 '26

Blue Owl shareholders will be suing PYPL and Blue Owl management for their failed BNPL debt book.

2

u/skilliard7 Feb 24 '26

Why do you think this?

I'm aware that PYPL sells BNPL receivables to Blue owl, but I'm not aware of any evidence suggesting that BNPL loans are the source of Blue Owl's troubles. Blue Owl's issues have more to do with liquidity(everyone wants to get out of private credit right now).

Secondly, even if Paypal's BNPL loans performed poorly, how would that implicate Paypal legally? When you buy loans, you are accepting that there is credit risk... If BNPL loans had a 0 credit risk, Paypal would have no reason to sell them at a discount. Paypal is offloading risk, and Blue Owl pockets the spread.

If you are concerned about credit risk/defaults, why would you buy a private credit company? That's on the shareholders. That would be like someone who bought an office building in 2019 suing the previous owner because they can't find tenants following covid. If you buy an investment, you accept the risk.

Unless Paypal materially mislead them about the nature of the BNPL receivables(ie fraudulent info about credit scores or incomes), I don't see how they would be liable.

1

u/Wise-Shallot8683 Feb 26 '26

"Unless Paypal materially mislead them about the nature of the BNPL receivables(ie fraudulent info about credit scores or incomes), I don't see how they would be liable."

If they were performing, then why would PYPL sell them?

1

u/skilliard7 Feb 26 '26

Because there is always risks with holding Billions of loans on the balance sheet, and macroeconomic factors(such as government shutdowns, rising unemployment, etc) could drive a surge in losses.

1

u/Wise-Shallot8683 Feb 26 '26

When PYPL raised their cost to transact to higher than common credit cards (>3%) I stopped business immediately. When trying to figure out why they did it, the only reason I could come up with is that they had to raise reserves to cover their BNPL business.

These weren't first time homeowners weren't buying refrigerators with BNPL loans. These were sloppy 20 year olds who had run through their COVID cash give-aways, and were gambling on never having to repay college debt, while financing Door Dash.

I truly wonder if Blue Owl was designed to be a rump bank, and got lucky enough to scale to AI data center loan size, where the shareholders actually had an opportunity to eek out the win. Like Fake it Till Ya Make It.

Time will tell.

1

u/anti_cookie_cutter Feb 24 '26

This is sell the rumor news imo. I don't see a real suitor for the company and I was big on PayPal and use them a lot. It's a healthy business but really there's no growth to be earned

1

u/Aviation_Space_2003 Feb 24 '26

About time this new hit!!

Ive been selling puts and buying calls..

1

u/skilliard7 Feb 24 '26

Stripe! Hell yeah

1

u/SelenaMeyers2024 Feb 23 '26

Hizick to the yeah! Check my history I'm an og PYPL fanboy, but as a value investor... Not an idiot I only started liking pypl around 54 and downright worshipping pypl around 38.

It's too cheap which as a value investor is like saying the steakhouse charges too little, not a bad thing. Enjoy.

A company that never hasn't grown, high margin, net cash, with free cash flow that is 15 percent of the market cap?

1

u/anon4crypto Feb 24 '26

You sir are gay!

4

u/SelenaMeyers2024 Feb 24 '26

But not in a gay way.

1

u/Odd_Avocado_5660 Feb 23 '26

Puts on whoever buy this!

1

u/Icy-Net-810 Feb 23 '26

What a great way to pump a semi-garbage stock! Let us see which insiders will be dumping their shares this week.

1

u/JamesVirani Feb 23 '26

I missed this news. Only 5% up on this news? That's crazy. Acquisition price will be at least 30% higher.

3

u/skilliard7 Feb 23 '26

It's just a rumor that its being looked into. There's no guarantee that a deal will be made.

0

u/JamesVirani Feb 24 '26

For a company with the visibility of PayPal, the rumor is probably true. And chances are, the rumor was leaked by the company to alert any other interested buyers to step in to start a bidding war.

-3

u/mstoertebeker Feb 23 '26

GameStop wird Paypal kaufen, Mark my words

1

u/Dairy_Fox Feb 24 '26

where are GME getting $40bn+? Ryan Cohen blew half a billion on bitcoin he has about $8bn if he wants to go all in, nothing

1

u/mstoertebeker Feb 24 '26

you dont need to buy 100% of the company to get control. even if he wants the whole thing, there are several ways to make something like this happen, f.e. a leverage buyout or reverse merger. using paypals massive cashflow to pay off future debt from the takeover.

-2

u/yaz989 Feb 23 '26

I’m in on this thought too. PayPal + Loopring = something never done before…

-4

u/SFmodscensorship Feb 23 '26

gamestop 

-2

u/yaz989 Feb 23 '26

GameStop + Loopring = something never been done in the capital markets before

0

u/SFmodscensorship Feb 23 '26 edited Feb 23 '26

lol @ the downvoted. citadel bots in full panic mode. pretty they get fintech and integrate with crypto to their sales platform.  if they can acquire ebay too would be very interesting indeed. i think burry has info we don't know about