EBay and PayPal are no longer an item, but new reports say Bitcoin may keep the companies together.
EBay.com president Devin Wenig has not ruled out incorporating Bitcoin into the business, he said in an interview with the Wall Street Journal Monday (Nov. 24).
The company’s openness to Bitcoin is in part due to PayPal’s experimentation with the currency, Wenig said, hinting at an ongoing relationship between eBay and PayPal despite the companies’ split earlier this year. “The separation has got to provide continuity of the relationship,” Wenig said. “That’s all being worked out.”
The executive did not elaborate on what eBay’s involvement with Bitcoin could entail, however. PayPal first launched a limited merchant opt-in scheme in September that saw a partnership with payment processors BitPay, GoCoin and CoinBase that facilitate payments made in Bitcoin.
While Bitcoin is likely in the future for eBay, Wenig seems cautious on any other drastic changes to the business in the future. He added that as eBay considers its own involvement wit Bitcoin, PayPal will remain “the dominant payment provider on eBay for a long time.”
And while EBay is reportedly keeping its eye on Alibaba, the e-commerce conglomerate that enjoyed a record-breaking IPO earlier this year, Wenig says eBay is unfazed by its closest US competitor, Amazon; eBay has no plans to integrate a service comparable to Amazon Prime, for example, unless consumers demand it.
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