GameStop reportedly eyes eBay acquisition, sending shares surging 13%

eBay shares jumped more than 13% in after-hours trading after reports that GameStop was preparing an offer for the marketplace giant, a move that would send the hobby’s most nostalgic retailer into one of its biggest possible market shocks. GameStop itself rose about 4% on the news, but the bigger question for players and collectors is what happens if a company built on used games tries to buy the place where so many of those games, consoles, statues, cards, and retro oddities actually change hands.

The proposed deal would be enormous by GameStop standards. eBay’s market value was about $46 billion, while GameStop’s was nearly $12 billion, which means any bid would likely need heavy debt, stock issuance, or both. That scale matters because it changes the economics of everything downstream, from seller fees to how aggressively a buyer could squeeze value out of the marketplace. A company with that much leverage could try to reshape the flow of used physical games, but it would also inherit the trust issues that come with policing fake listings, misgraded cartridges, and inflated “rare” retro prices.

Ryan Cohen has already been pushing GameStop through a drastic turnaround. He joined the board in January 2021, became chief executive in September 2023, and in January 2026 the company unveiled a compensation package worth roughly $35 billion if it hits a $100 billion market value and $10 billion in cumulative performance EBITDA. That is the same GameStop that reported a 14% drop in revenue to $1.10 billion for the holiday quarter, underscoring how much pressure remains on the business as physical game sales keep shrinking and digital downloads keep taking more of the market.

eBay, by contrast, has been posting steadier numbers. It reported $3.0 billion in revenue and $21.2 billion in gross merchandise volume for the fourth quarter of 2025, then said first-quarter 2026 active buyers reached 136 million, with revenue of $3.1 billion and GMV of $22.2 billion. The company also leaned harder into collectibles, motor accessories, live-streamed auctions, and eBay Live, which expanded to Germany and Australia. It even authorized an incremental $2.0 billion share repurchase program in February.

That mix is exactly why a GameStop move would hit the hobby hard. eBay is already a major engine for sealed games, graded slabs, loose carts, and the long tail of retro hardware. If GameStop got control, the upside could be tighter curation and more direct access to physical inventory. The downside is equally obvious: more concentration, less seller flexibility, and a marketplace that could start feeling less like the open flea market collectors know and more like a controlled pipeline.