PayPal CEO Enrique Lores’ turnaround plan for the fintech company could include a sale of the company itself. Talks with Stripe and private equity firm Advent have intensified in recent weeks.
Stripe and Advent first offered to buy PayPal in July for $60.50 a share. That bid would have valued the company at $53 billion, according to reporting at the time. PayPal rejected the offer. Negotiations continued anyway. A deal could still take shape in the coming weeks, based on more recent accounts that cite unnamed sources.
PayPal has declined to comment on the reports. A Stripe spokesperson said the company does not comment on rumors or speculation.
These discussions come as Lores works to reverse the company’s lagging performance. He joined PayPal in March after years at HP. In April he launched the first steps of his turnaround plan. Those moves included an executive shuffle and a split of the business into three operating models: checkout solutions and PayPal, consumer financial services (including Venmo), and payment services and crypto.
A month after that reorganization, Lores told investors the company would recommit to fundamentals. That meant “becoming a technology company again.” The turnaround also includes cost-saving measures expected to cut the workforce by 20% over the next two to three years.
PayPal was founded in 1998 by a group that included Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, Max Levchin, Luke Nosek, and others. The company grew sharply during the pandemic on the back of an e-commerce boom. In the years since, it has struggled.