EBay Reports Stronger Earnings - NYTimes.com SAN FRANCISCO - EBay's net income rose in the critical fourth quarter, the company said Wednesday, but it advised investors that the current quarter's results would be lower than analyst forecasts. EBay said net income in the fourth quarter rose to $1.98 billion, or $1.51 cents a share, from $559 million, or 42 cents a share, in the same quarter a year ago. The result included a gain on the sale of its remaining investment in Skype. The company said revenue climbed 35 percent to $3.4 billion from the same period in 2010. On an operating income basis, earnings increased 27.6 percent. The net income was above the expectations of Wall Street analysts. They had expected 57 cents a share and revenue of $3.3 billion, according to consensus estimates from Capital IQ. The company, based in San Jose, Calif., said that the success of eBay's marketplace business and PayPal unit had contributed to a solid quarter. "We had a strong fourth-quarter finish to an excellent year," John Donahoe, eBay's chief executive, said in a statement. Revenue from the company's marketplace business grew 16 percent in the fourth quarter to $1.7 billion, up from $1.52 billion in the same period a year ago. EBay's payments unit - which consists almost entirely of PayPal - reported $1.24 billion in revenue in the three months ending Dec. 31, up 28 percent from the same period last year. The earnings report follows the departure of Scott Thompson as PayPal's president to become Yahoo's chief executive. PayPal more than doubled its user base and revenue under Mr. Thompson's leadership. Much of eBay's future growth will depend on the success of PayPal's new mobile payments products, which reached $4 billion in 2011, more than five times the payment volume in 2010, the company said. Mr. Donahoe said he would serve as interim president of PayPal until eBay finds a replacement. For the current quarter, eBay said it expected net revenue to come in between $3.05 billion and $3.15 billion. Analysts had been expecting revenue of $3.18 billion.