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Company research3 Jun 2024
The PayPal Story: Online Payment Pioneers
A comprehensive rundown of PayPals history, its founders, and key strategies that enabled the company to revolutionize online payments.
PayPal
PayPal (PYPL) investor relations material
PayPal Q3 2026 earnings summary
Complete event summary combining all related documents: earnings call transcript, report, and slide presentation.Q3 2026 earnings summary27 Oct, 2026
Executive summary
Q3 TPV was $487.1B, up 6% reported and 7% FXN; revenue was $8.584B, up 2% reported and 1% FXN.
Transaction margin dollars grew 2% to $3.950B, or 3% excluding interest on customer balances; non-GAAP EPS rose 8% to $1.45.
GAAP operating income fell 8% to $1.402B and net income declined 14% to $1.073B, while non-GAAP operating income grew 3%.
Growth broadened across financial services, Venmo and Braintree; branded checkout remained in the 1%-2% growth range amid European tariff-related pressure.
Financial highlights
Transaction revenue increased 3% to $7.711B; other value-added services revenue declined 2% to $873M.
Non-GAAP operating income was $1.613B, up 3%; non-GAAP operating margin expanded 16 bps to 18.8%.
GAAP diluted EPS was $1.25, down 4%; non-GAAP diluted EPS was $1.45, up 8%.
Adjusted free cash flow was $2.047B, down 10% YoY; operating cash flow was $1.592B and free cash flow was $1.431B.
Non-transaction operating expenses grew 1% to $2.337B.
Outlook and guidance
FY2026 transaction margin dollar guidance rose to ~$15.7B, or ~$14.6B excluding interest on customer balances; mid-single-digit growth is a medium-term target.
FY2026 non-GAAP EPS guidance rose to ~$5.60 and adjusted FCF guidance to at least $6.5B; GAAP EPS guidance was reaffirmed at ~$5.07.
FY2026 share repurchase guidance is $6B and CAPEX guidance is ~$1B; non-transaction OpEx is expected to grow mid-single digits.
Q4 outlook: currency-neutral revenue growth in the low double digits, slightly positive transaction margin dollar growth, flat-to-low-single-digit non-transaction OpEx growth and non-GAAP EPS of ~$1.43.
At least $1.5B in gross annualized run-rate savings is targeted over 2-3 years, including >$700M exiting Q4 2026; a significant portion will be reinvested in priority growth initiatives.
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Latest events from PayPal
- Consumer-centric strategy, tech upgrades, and cost savings drive growth despite European headwinds.PYPL
Goldman Sachs Communacopia + Technology Conference 2026 - Revenue up 5% to $8.68B, TPV up 10%, guidance raised, and $1.5B returned to shareholders.PYPLQ2 2026
- AI-driven modernization and unified platforms are transforming merchant and consumer experiences.PYPL2026 Evercore Global TMT Conference
- AI-driven transformation and cost savings target sustainable profit and growth through 2028.PYPLBernstein 42nd Annual Strategic Decisions Conference
- Board, compensation, and equity plan approved; shareholder proposals failed; new strategy outlined.PYPLAGM 2026
- Revenue up 7%, TPV up 11%, and $1.5B in cost savings targeted via reorganization.PYPLQ1 2026
- EPS up 18% year-over-year, guidance raised, and $1.5B returned to shareholders.PYPLQ2 2025
- Q3 2024 saw 6% revenue growth, 9% TPV growth, and non-GAAP EPS up 22%, with $1.8B in buybacks.PYPLQ3 2024
- Targeting double-digit EPS growth by 2027 through AI-driven innovation and global expansion.PYPLInvestor Day 2025
Next PayPal earnings date
KBW Fintech Ecosystem Conference 202610 Nov, 2026
PayPal
Next PayPal earnings date
KBW Fintech Ecosystem Conference 202610 Nov, 2026
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Frequently asked questions
Simplifying peer-to-peer payments
PayPal Holdings Inc is an American fin-tech company that engages in the online payments industry. It develops solutions that enable its customers to transfer money online. It has become a leader in the industry challenging traditional ways of transferring money such as checks, with over 325 million accounts globally. PayPal can be used by both private individuals and businesses to buy things online, send payments to other PayPal users, and request payments. It makes most of its revenues by charging the users a fee on transactions. The Company was founded in 1998 and is headquartered in San Jose, California.
Further reading: The Payment's Value Chain: A Complex Ecosystem
A subsidiary of eBay
Not long after its IPO in 2002, PayPal was acquired by eBay the same year. Many of the eBay users were already utilizing eBay on their auctions and it was a key step to enable online processing of financial transactions. As a subsidiary of eBay, PayPal reached 100 million active users in 2010 located in 190 markets and enabling transactions in 25 different currencies.
In 2015 PayPal was spun off from eBay to an independent and publicly traded company again by pressure from the notorious hedge fund activist Carl Ichan. In 2018, PayPal acquired the Swedish company iZettle, founded by Jacob de Geer and Magnus Nilsson, to further enhance their in-store payment capabilities.
The PayPal Mafia
PayPal, as we know it today, was formed through a merger between Confinity, which was founded by Peter Thiel, Luke Nosek, and Max Levchin, and X.com, which was founded by Elon Musk. After the merger, the company was renamed PayPal in 2001.
The founders and early employees of PayPal have later been referred to as the “PayPal Mafia” due to many of them later went on and founded other successful ventures. For example, Elon Musk went on and founded Tesla, SpaceX, OpenAI, and Neuralink. Other examples include Peter Thiel, founder of Palantir Technologies and the first outside investor in Facebook, Reid Hoffman, founder of LinkedIn (acquired by Microsoft in 2016), and the founders of YouTube (acquired by Alphabet in 2006).
The Braintree acquisition
In 2013, PayPal acquired the Chicago-based company Braintree. The acquisition further enhanced PayPal’s capabilities in enabling online payments for e-commerce and merchants such as One Touch Payments which doesn’t require a sign-up or new entering of credit card details when you buy something online.
The One Touch Payment solution was initially developed by Venmo that was acquired by Braintree in 2012.
Today, Venmo is one of the leading peer-to-peer transactions services that enable individuals to send transfer money between each other. In 2021, Venmo handled over 200 billion U.S. dollars in payments.