EBay Looking Into NFT Marketplace: How The Auction Site Could Gain More Monetizable Users

In an interview on CNBC Monday, eBay Inc's EBAY CEO discussed how the large online auction and transaction platform could play into the growth of non-fungible tokens.

What Happened: CEO John Iannone discussed several topics including how the company can continue to play the growth of cryptocurrency.

“We’re looking at how can we explore that better,” Iannone said.

Iannone said eBay is discussing ways to be better involved in the growth of NFTs. He highlighted the company’s 187 million buyers who come to the platform to complete transactions.

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Why It’s Important: The growth of NFTs in 2021 has seen the launch of several transaction platforms. With fees for buyers and sellers, transaction platforms could be one of the ways to play the growth of NFTs.

“This is the place that sellers come to get scaled demand,” Iannone said.

The CEO said collectibles have been on eBay for decades and moving NFTs to the platform could be a natural fit. Iannone said NFTs from platforms like NBA Top Shot are already being transacted on eBay.

A search for NBA top Shot on eBay Monday returned 575 results and a search for Topps NFT returned 1,367 transactions. Topps is going public in a SPAC deal with Mudrick Capital Acquisition Corporation II MUDS and has plans to continue NFT expansion.

Iannone said eBay is already seeing users bring their offline business online through the company’s reach to reach additional potential buyers. The same could be expanded with NFT offerings on eBay.

Iannone highlighted eBay is gaining more younger buyers with product offerings like sneakers on the site. Those users then spend time on the platform and buy additional items. The same could happen if eBay can integrate NFT sales on its platform. EBay can gain new customers and cross-sell them to other marketplace items.

EBay reported first-quarter revenue up 42% year-over-year to $3 billion. Gross merchandise value was up 29% year-over-year to $27.5 billion. The company ended the first quarter with 187 million global active buyers up 7% year-over-year and 20 million active sellers, up 8% year-over-year.

Price Action: Shares of eBay are up 5% to $58.54 on Monday.