原文标题：PayPal in $45 billion bid for Pinterest -sources
原文连结：https://reurl.cc/aNZnv3
发布时间：Wed, October 20, 2021, 11:41 PM
原文内容：
(Reuters) - PayPal Holdings Inc has offered to buy digital pinboard site
Pinterest Inc for $45 billion, people familiar with the matter said on
Wednesday, a combination that could herald more financial technology and
social media tie-ups in e-ecommerce.
It would be the biggest acquisition of a social media company, surpassing
Microsoft Corp's $26.2 billion purchase of LinkedIn in 2016.
The deal talks come as internet shoppers increasingly buy items they see on
social media, often following "influencers" on platforms such as Instagram
and TikTok. Acquiring Pinterest would allow PayPal to capture more of that
e-commerce growth and diversify its income though advertising revenue.
PayPal has offered $70 per share, mostly in stock, for Pinterest, one of the
sources said. The online payments provider hopes to successfully negotiate
and announce a deal by the time it reports quarterly earnings on Nov. 8, the
source added.
The sources cautioned that no deal was certain and terms could change. They
asked not to be identified because the matter is confidential.
PayPal and Pinterest did not respond to requests for comment. Bloomberg News
first reported on the companies' talks on Wednesday.
PayPal shares fell 4.9% to close at $258.36, while Pinterest shares jumped
12.8% to $62.68.
"(The) combination would be a significant positive for PayPal's ongoing
monetization initiatives on both sides of its merchant and consumer
platforms, especially if Pinterest's social commerce platform gets integrated
with Honey's AI into PayPal's destination app," Wedbush analysts wrote in a
note.
The payments behemoth was among the big winners of the COVID-19 pandemic, as
more people used its services to shop online and pay bills to avoid stepping
out. Its shares have risen about 36% in the last 12 months, giving it a
market capitalization of nearly $320 billion.
Pinterest was valued at about $13 billion when it went public in 2019. It
also saw a huge spike in users looking for crafts and DIY project ideas, as
lockdown curbs kept people at home.
As lockdowns eased, Pinterest has warned about slowing user growth,
especially in the United States, its largest market. It has said it expects
revenue growth mainly through deeper engagement with existing users rather
than signing up new ones.
The market has valued Pinterest shares more cheaply than those of some
younger social media platforms such as Snap Inc but higher than more mature
companies such as Twitter Inc, according to Refinitiv Eikon valuation metrics.
PayPal's offer represents a 26% premium to Pinterest's closing price of
$55.58 on Tuesday and it is equivalent to 62 times the social media company's
earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization over the last
12 months, according to Eikon.
By that metric, Microsoft paid 79 times LinkedIn's earnings when it acquired
it in all-cash deal. Pinterest, however, would be giving its shareholders
some of PayPal's stock, in a bet that this currency would appreciate over
time over time as the combined company reaps revenue and cost synergies.
Pinterest is at a crossroads after co-founder Evan Sharp announced last week
he would step down as chief creative officer to join LoveFrom, a firm led by
Jony Ive, the designer of many Apple Inc products.
Sharp founded the online scrapbook and photo-sharing platform in 2010 with
Ben Silbermann, who is the San Francisco, California-based company's chief
executive officer, and Paul Sciarra, who left in 2012.
PayPal had been looking to boost its e-commerce offerings in recent years
through acquisitions. It bought online coupon finder Honey Science in 2019
for $4 billion and Japanese buy-now-pay-later (BNPL) firm Paidy for $2.7
billion earlier this year. It acquired return-service provider Happy Returns
in May.
SOCIAL MEDIA-DRIVEN COMMERCE
Social media platforms that have not pursued mergers with fintech firms have
been working on ways to allow consumers to buy directly from their platforms.
TikTok, for example, is testing a way for users to buy products directly on
its short video app. It has partnered with ecommerce giant Shopify and in
August began allowing retail brands to link their product catalogs to the app.
Analysts said the PayPal-Pinterest deal talks highlight the potential for
other social media and fintech companies to join forces to capture swaths of
the e-commerce market.
"Social/interactive commerce is growing in the United States and no one has
won it yet. So rather than going against Amazon, PayPal is making a bet on a
different kind of shopping model," said Marketplace Pulse e-commerce analyst
Joe Kaziukas.
心得/评论：
"匿名人士爆料" PYPL 要买 PINS (一股70，大约 45b)
如属实将超越 MSFT 买 LinkedIn 成为史上最大金额社群软件并购案
PINS 暴涨12% (收盘价 62.68)
PYPL 大跌快5%
我看市场也不怎么相信那个数字
不然今天 PINS 就会一口气涨到70左右了
这和当初 CRM 并购 SLACK 不一样
那个一出来就是确实新闻
weird move for PYPL anyway