GameStop, a chain of physical video game and merchandise stores, is also well known for achieving legendary status among meme stocks. Now, the games retailer is looking to buy eBay in a surprise acquisition.
The company announced its intention to purchase the e-commerce giant at $125 per stock, a 46 percent premium to eBay's closing stock price on Feb. 4, 2026. The deal values eBay at approximately $55.5 billion, which will make everyone ask the same question: Where will GameStop, whose own market cap is roughly $11.8 billion, get that kind of money?
To understand this, we need to take a step back. Once a giant with more than 6,000 stores globally, GameStop started declining in the 2010s as folks started getting their games predominantly from the internet. This made it one of the most shorted stocks ever, with investors betting its value would plummet further as its business continues to decline.
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In 2021, however, GameStop was revived by a Reddit community of traders who started buying the stock en masse, driving short sellers out and pumping GameStop's stock to new all-time highs. The stock price has since declined, and the business still faces serious headwinds, but the company pivoted to collectibles and digital assets, as well as a Bitcoin treasury strategy.
Now, GameStop has about $9.4 billion of cash and liquid investments on its balance sheet, as well as third-party financing that goes up to $20 billion. That should be good enough, GameStop claims, for half the offer; the other half will come from GameStop common stock. Finally, GameStop has quietly been buying eBay shares, and it already owns a 5 percent stake in the company.
GameStop plans to improve eBay's business, which has been doing better on its own lately, with a combination of cost-cutting measures. GameStop will also leverage its remaining retail locations to "give eBay a national network for authentication, intake, fulfillment, and live commerce."
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