PALO ALTO, Calif. PayPal, the leading provider of online person-to-person payments, on Tuesday vehemently denied speculation that it was up for sale.
It is absolutely incorrect, said Vincent Sollitto, a PayPal spokesman. In fact the company has declined multiple acquisition offers.
Mr. Sollitto was responding to a report posted on Red Herrings Web site Tuesday that said PayPals venture capital backers had put the company up for sale and that it was being shopped around to several potential buyers, including eOne Global, First Data Corp.s Internet payments company.
Garen Staglin, chief executive officer of eOne Global, did not retract his statement in the article that his company had been approached about acquiring PayPal, but he declined to comment further. Four of PayPals venture capital investors could not be reached for comment.
Mr. Solitto noted that PayPal, which executes about 200,000 transactions a day, completed a $90 million round of financing in February. That will provide us with more than enough cash to take us to profitability and beyond, he said.
Avivah Litan, research director at Gartner of Stamford, Conn., said a sale does not make sense in light of the round of financing and PayPals recent international expansion.
They are on the path to profitability, and they could take some steps to be profitable more quickly if they had to, she said.
