Ryan Cohen, founder of Chewy and chief executive of GameStop, said he is prepared to present his company's unsolicited proposal for eBay to shareholders after the online marketplace's board rejected the bid and labeled it "neither credible nor attractive." Cohen made the comment in a June 4 interview with Barron’s.
Cohen defended the offer as credible and as aligned with shareholder interests. He argued that there are meaningful commercial overlaps between the two businesses that would generate value for both sets of investors. "The categories where we’re having the most success, eBay is as well. And what eBay is doing online, we’re doing offline," he said. "These are businesses that tie in very well."
GameStop has been repositioning its business in recent quarters, and Cohen highlighted the company’s recent financial momentum. The company reported its most profitable quarter on record, a result Cohen attributed to years of cost reductions and the pruning of underperforming retail locations. Under his leadership, GameStop has shifted from a meme-driven videogame retailer to a stronger presence in collectibles and refurbished technology.
Those product categories, Cohen said, overlap with eBay’s core marketplace. He pointed to the collectibles and refurbished technology categories specifically as areas where GameStop is seeing strong performance and where combined scale with eBay could be complementary.
GameStop has accumulated a 7.8% ownership stake in eBay as part of the effort. "I want to own eBay," Cohen said. "I want to own it for the long term. It’s a great business that’s been poorly managed."
While Cohen emphasized first-quarter operating earnings as the best in GameStop’s history and reiterated his view of strategic fit, eBay’s board publicly rejected the proposal, describing it as lacking credibility and appeal. Cohen’s next step, as stated in the interview, is to take the offer to shareholders to make the case directly to owners of the company.
Context and implications
- GameStop’s stronger profitability and category shifts form the backdrop for the proposal.
- Cohen is pursuing an activist path that now extends to a formal stake and a public push for shareholder support.
- eBay’s board has so far resisted the overture, setting up a potential contest between management and a large external investor.