After the message that GameStop is looking to buy eBay, CEO Ryan Cohen confirmed that he has delivered an unsolicited acquisition proposal to the company as he builds on its recent comeback. This offer to eBay will raise some questions and quite a bit of intrigue, as GameStop itself is not doing very well financially, and eBay is even outselling it in the market.
GameStop has been in a bit of an odd place over the past decade. The once-popular video game retailer struggled to keep up with the growing digital-only video game industry and the retail giant that is Amazon, forcing it to switch to licensed merchandise and selling baseball cards. Recently, GameStop has even delved into selling retro games in select stores. As of 2023, the company has found itself under new management, now led by Ryan Cohen, dubbed GameStop's “Meme King” after its 2021 frenzy in a brief stock squeeze. Meanwhile, eBay has also seen its fair share of financial challenges as companies like Amazon continue to put pressure on the sales market. As eBay struggled to improve its bottom line, sellers began reporting lower sales volumes amid rising fees and reduced profit margins.
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GameStop wants to buy eBay at a premium
Now, GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen has announced his intention to acquire eBay for $125.00 per share, for a total of $55.5 billion. GameStop's official release to investors states that this price is 46% higher than eBay's closing price on February 4, 2026, when GameStop first purchased the company. By comparison, GameStop was valued at roughly $25.00 per share, with a market cap of roughly $11 billion, at the same time. Cohen said a GameStop-eBay merger could create a serious competitor to Amazon, which was a common competitor of the two companies.
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EBay confirmed that it had received an unsolicited non-binding proposal from GameStop, saying that there had been no discussions with the company prior to the proposal. eBay's board of directors will review the proposal and evaluate what is best for eBay and shareholders going forward and urges shareholders to take no action at this time. However, if GameStop's offer is rejected, it won't take no for an answer. If eBay rejects the deal, Cohen has said he is prepared to launch a hostile bid for the company with the goal of valuing it in the hundreds of billions of dollars. Shares of GameStop have fallen 2% since the news, while eBay is up 5%.
It's been clear for several years now that Amazon has taken significant market share from both GameStop and eBay. The logistics, convenience and membership of Amazon Prime have made shopping from the company far more attractive to consumers than GameStop or eBay, whose shopping experiences have been in decline in recent years. However, Cohen's offer to merge GameStop and eBay to take on the retail giant that is Amazon seems a little puzzling. The deal would saddle GameStop with a huge amount of debt and merge two companies that have been battling a volatile consumer market for a decade on seemingly flimsy grounds.
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Ryan Cohen reports that the tie-up could lead to GameStop stores serving as authentication centers for items sold on eBay, such as trading cards or retro games. GameStop and eBay could potentially dominate the vintage collectibles and retro games market, which are resale strongholds for eBay and naturally synergistic with GameStop, but they are still niche markets that are unlikely to generate significant sales for either company. What the future holds for GameStop is anyone's guess, as the company has proven time and time again that it refuses to go down quietly.
