Will Ryan Cohen Owning eBay Be a Disaster for Normal Sellers?

[00:00:00]Okay, guys. This is not a normal GramsPop's video. We are going to stray from our normal format. Um we're not giving numbers today, but we have a more interesting topic to talk about.

[00:00:09]>> We keep hearing about this Ryan Cohen buying eBay thing, and the more we hear about it, we don't get less confused. We actually have more questions the more we hear about it because what we're hearing, we felt needed some deeper research.

[00:00:21]>> You are not going to find a more detailed researched video.

[00:00:25]>> Teresa was not happy with me because I literally spent like 40 hours straight digging up documents from SEC documents and Chewy stuff and and GameStop stuff.

[00:00:35]Like we went through the full gamut. I researched all the way back as far as I could on Ryan Cohen, what his motivations are. Like we really dug in and Teresa was kind of annoyed about it.

[00:00:43]>> I still love how you say we.

[00:00:46]>> It's a It's a proverbial we. It's the GramsPop's we.

[00:00:48]>> say I.

[00:00:49]>> [laughter] >> I didn't even know he was doing it until like 11:00 last night.

[00:00:53]>> I watched and the more interviews I saw with Ryan Cohen, the big question that kept coming up is I couldn't tell for sure if this merger or this acquisition, it wouldn't be a merger, if this purchase and Ryan becoming in charge of eBay would actually fix things at eBay, or is it a lot more slanted towards just giving GameStop something to do?

[00:01:10]>> Some of the things we keep hearing is that GameStop is going to be an authenticator. Um they want to turn their GameStop buildings, their brick-and-mortar buildings into live um selling studios. I don't know if that's for people or if it's for >> For their employees to sell.

[00:01:24]>> Their employees to sell. Like you sell your stuff to GameStop and GameStop will then do live live selling. Um and also that they want that they are turning theirs into a um digital gaming market.

[00:01:35]Like so you can sell things from within a game, which I don't know how that works.

[00:01:39]>> want to introduce a gaming like a like an in-game marketplace on eBay for for gamers to sell their their epic swords or whatever it is they're selling. So, that's something they want to do. They keep talking about.

[00:01:51]>> Like that that's what I keep hearing.

[00:01:53]Like I that's the pieces that keep sticking out from all the interviews that I've watched or kind of watched when Corey watches them.

[00:01:59]>> So, that brings up a big question. For normal sellers like you and me who are selling >> everything.

[00:02:04]>> Like a pair of shoes to a a handle for a Crock-Pot that was from the '80s, how does any of that help us? How does that affect us? But more importantly, does it do anything good for us? And eBay already has an authentication system, and it's actually one that works pretty smoothly. I've never had a complaint about their authentication system.

[00:02:20]>> knock on wood, we've never had anything rejected from authentication.

[00:02:23]>> So, now they're saying I need to source the item, clean it, photograph it, list it, answer the 12 questions from somebody out there that shouldn't be asking questions on the internet, sell the item, and now I get to take an extra trip to the mall to bring it to GameStop.

[00:02:36]>> A lot of people, those of us who live in rural areas, don't live close to a GameStop. Our nearest GameStop is 45 minutes away.

[00:02:42]>> We have heard talk about the statistics with GameStop's. There's the you know, like pretty much everybody in America lives within 8 minutes of a GameStop or something like that. And that's great if you're talking about the majorly populated areas of the country. We're at least 45 minutes from the nearest GameStop where we're at.

[00:02:57]>> Well, could could you even imagine like the places that are farther north than us? I don't think there's a GameStop 45 minutes north of us. So, that's an hour and a half drive for people that sell.

[00:03:04]>> I mean, I think we're probably the exception, not the rule. But if we're talking about doing this for people in Chicago, in New York, in Detroit, fine.

[00:03:11]If we're talking about doing this for people in rural South Dakota or rural Kansas or rural anywhere, then no longer fine. And it's an extra trip no matter how you slice it. Even if I have to take it 8 minutes away from me, it's still an additional trip. I don't So, in terms of the normal seller like you and I, >> Mhm.

[00:03:27]>> I'm So far, like these are the questions we keep coming up with. Not Not is Ryan qualified, we'll get to that. Not is this a good idea to purchase, can he fix anything, more why does he want it, and what the hell does that do for us?

[00:03:41]>> Here's what we're going to get at.

[00:03:42]Here's what we're asking. One, does he have the Corey always says the chops run it. Does he have the ability to run it is how I would put it. Um is it good for everyday sellers like you and I? Or you and you and us? Or is it just about what eBay can do for GameStop to make GameStop bigger?

[00:04:00]>> All right. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to The Reseller Vault. My name's Corey.

[00:04:03]>> I'm Teresa.

[00:04:04]>> And we're Grams & Pops Vintage. And today we're going to get into the Ryan Cohen topic. So, I guess the main thing we want you to know about this video is it's not an investment video. We're not try We don't care what the stock does tomorrow.

[00:04:13]>> Mhm.

[00:04:14]>> We I mean, that doesn't matter to us. We don't want the stock to go down, but it really doesn't matter to us.

[00:04:17]>> We don't care what the stock does any day for this.

[00:04:20]>> [laughter] >> What we really want to know in this video is if he was to purchase eBay, what does that do for normal sellers like you and me? And I don't really care about the rest of it. The rest of it's cool, and maybe it's good, maybe it's bad. What does it actually do for people like you and me? Is it Is it a net positive or is this a very one-sided thing? So, those are the questions we want to answer, and we really had to dig deep to figure out what we think.

[00:04:42]>> Currently, eBay, as we all know, is a place where people like Corey and I, which we're just regular people, sell regular stuff to other regular people like us. Well, not everybody's like us, but >> So, the thing is through all these interviews and everything we've heard and seen on Ryan Cohen taking over eBay, it's never really mentioned what happens to the guy that's selling a a pulley for a lawnmower from 1975 that's trying to restore an an antique mower. Like, that's kind of the type of stuff that a lot of us sell, clothing, antiques, collectibles, stuff like that.

[00:05:15]Stuff that's not as exciting as the new Funko Pop or the brand new trading card.

[00:05:20]>> Or the newest or a of a video game.

[00:05:23]>> Right. So, >> That's what makes me think of video games cuz it's GameStop, but >> So, where does that leave us? And what we kind of came up with so far is that we're not we're not saying Ryan Cohen is stupid. I think he's actually far from stupid. From everything I've seen, he's a very intelligent guy.

[00:05:36]But also, we're not saying that Ryan Cohen is a good force for eBay. That he would be good for the eBay platform.

[00:05:42]Now, whether or not he's super intelligent and a bad choice for eBay, both things can be true or both things can be false. So, that's what we're going to explore here.

[00:05:51]>> The standards that we used while creating this um in order to answer, you know, whether he's good for eBay is what has he done? What has he done in his past? What is he currently doing? Um what is he proposing during the purchase of eBay?

[00:06:05]Who benefits the most from him trying to purchase eBay or him purchasing eBay? And can we trust Ryan to not ruin the part of eBay that works for us? Yes, people are going to complain that eBay doesn't work, but it works in general for most people.

[00:06:21]>> First question we had to answer was who in the hell is Ryan Cohen because we really didn't we didn't know.

[00:06:26]>> I didn't know of him until he proposed to eBay, so >> Here's what we found out and I will say it's kind of limited, but we did find out he was he was it sounds like he was born and raised in Montreal, Canada and his dad was a an entrepreneur who ran a glass importing business and that's probably some of his first exposure to learning the ins and outs of business.

[00:06:45]>> He did not take a traditional route.

[00:06:47]He's kind of like me. Well, no, cuz I did take a traditional route later in life. Later [laughter] No, later in life. He didn't he didn't take the traditional college route. He learned, you know, website affiliate marketing, online marketing, online ads.

[00:07:01]>> And it sounds like he did this early enough like before it was the popular thing to do online. So, it sounds like he got in early on this and then most recently that we could that we know of because we heard in one of the interviews was he was getting ready to start an online jewelry business using all the previous skills he learned.

[00:07:17]>> Like making jewelry or >> Like buying and selling jewelry.

[00:07:20]>> selling. So, hey, he's like Dapper and Dazzle.

[00:07:22]>> New jewelry, though.

[00:07:23]>> Oh.

[00:07:24]>> Like he was he was going to sound like he was going to import jewelry and sell it.

[00:07:27]And he realized partway into that that he had no passion for it. He didn't know anything about jewelry. He didn't care about jewelry and it wasn't where he wanted to go and then that's where the flip to Chewy happened, which is again, there's a lot of mystery in this still because how do you go from sitting in in a basement and getting ready to launch a a jewelry store to >> Hey, let's sell some stuff.

[00:07:49]>> dollar Chewy dog food. Like how do how do you get there? I don't know. But he does explain a little bit of this in one of his interviews, so we'll drop it in here.

[00:07:56]>> I kind of want to start off with where did you get your passion for entrepreneurship?

[00:07:59]>> From my father. I saw growing up, I didn't spend that much time in school.

[00:08:06]Uh I would go to his office and I would He taught me hard work. It's where I got my my education from.

[00:08:15]>> Um you started building websites as a teenager and you kind of chose that path instead of college. Do do you think you understood the internet revolution before a lot of people understood what was happening?

[00:08:26]>> Definitely. I mean, I I saw the opportunity to be able to scale something beyond a local market. And so, there's the opportunity to grow and to touch consumers globally. It's pretty incredible to be able to to locally scale something globally um by using performance marketing and being able to directly measure return on investment in in real time. And so, I became really good at AdWords uh and and Yahoo at the time. That's That's how I got my start. We I was about to uh get into actually the online jewelry business and I bought hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of online jewelry.

[00:09:10]I didn't know anything about it. Um but I assumed the markets the margins were high cuz it was jewelry.

[00:09:19]And I wanted to build something online.

[00:09:21]And so, spent months basically building out the website, the front end, the back end, uh the distribution. Basically sold all of the jewelry for like 80 or 90 cents on the dollar, luckily.

[00:09:34]And within a few weeks, totally pivoted to selling uh pet products online.

[00:09:41]>> So, he does have real business experience. He Based on previously, he does know marketing and advertising.

[00:09:47]And he's not just like a rich founder, like somebody who had money and then just sunk it into something.

[00:09:52]>> I can't find any evidence that he was just born with a silver spoon. I also can't find any evidence that he started with nothing and and built a company as from a paper clip. So, I can't find evidence either way. So, your guess is good as mine here. There's a lot of mystery in who is Ryan Cohen.

[00:10:08]And part of that is because there are no public records out there that really disclose if if he had help from family, did he have early capital, did he get investments from somebody else? Like, how did he get from from doing an online internet business in your basement to I have the capital for Chewy? Like, we don't know that part, but that is where like pre-Chewy, there wasn't much Ryan Cohen out there that we could find. So, in all of our research to date, that the strongest case for Ryan Cohen so far is Chewy.

[00:10:35]>> Chewy is the reason not to dismiss Ryan from being able to do what he says. He built a national retailer brand.

[00:10:41]He has billions of dollars in sales, millions of customers. He has fulfillment centers all over.

[00:10:48]>> He was also handling juggling things like auto ship and and customer service.

[00:10:53]And I don't think anybody that ever used Chewy can say the customer service wasn't phenomenal.

[00:10:56]>> No, they send you a notification when your puppy dies.

[00:10:59]>> He handled aggressive supplier negotiations. I like borderline legendarily aggressive supplier negotiations.

[00:11:06]>> Is it better than Walmart?

[00:11:08]>> I I would [laughter] say more aggressive almost than Walmart. Like, from everything I could find those supplier negotiations, I would have liked to sit in on them. So, he's got that going for him. He had great marketing going for him. Like, they You can't say Chewy didn't have great marketing.

[00:11:21]>> And he built a real management team.

[00:11:24]>> Which speaks pretty highly of him as as a CEO. So, for for never being on the scene before and then and of a sudden popping up and and has that resume. Like Chewy is a pretty strong indicator of Ryan's abilities, even though there's no history to find like how did he go from zero to that? We can't find it, but the proof is in the pudding with Chewy. So, here's some of the things Ryan actually said about this himself. You watch this clip.

[00:11:48]>> Yeah, I looked at it. The reason why I moved from jewelry to pet food was cuz it was a recurring item. So, I love the fact that it was consumable and when we started Chewy for the first few years, we just focused on food, treats, litter, all of the things that people are buying all the time. The vision and the idea was if we treat our customers well, they're going to continue shopping with us.

[00:12:11]And and that's what we did. And so, it was everything from the handwritten holiday cards to the pet portraits to 24/7 customer service. And uh if there was ever an issue, you know, we took care of the customer.

[00:12:24]>> All right, so you can't really think of Ryan as a guy sitting in a beanbag chair somewhere saying, "Let's go disrupt the dog food industry." He was actually in it and operating inside of it.

[00:12:33]>> But we have to remember Chewy was losing a lot of money. They were using a crap ton, that's a word I like to use, of outside capital and they were never a mature cash machine, like making money.

[00:12:43]>> Yeah, not while he ran it. They weren't.

[00:12:45]Now, he did scale it to amazing heights.

[00:12:47]Nobody can deny him that, but he never actually made that company profitable and I don't think anybody can dispute the fact that it's easier to be a great operator when you can throw money at all the problems, >> Mhm.

[00:13:00]>> especially if the money is not your money. If you're doing it from investor money. [laughter] >> Can somebody give me money that I can just throw away?

[00:13:07]>> Yeah. Not not to take away from his accomplishments because I think what he accomplished was was genuinely super good. Like I don't think anybody could say Ryan's not not doing a good job as a CEO, but he doesn't have a proven track record and running an unprofitable company while throwing money at problems to build its net value up.

[00:13:26]Actually, it speaks to a set of a set of skills, but not necessarily the set of skills that I want to see transferred to eBay. I don't want to see eBay running unprofitably and throwing investor money around. So, I guess what I'm saying is Chewy proves that Ryan can actually do some cool things for a company. He can scale it. He can do a lot of really good things. He's a great operator. But, it does not prove that he can run a profitable company. Those two things can actually exist at the same time. So, GameStop was kind of the warning label, at least it was for us. At GameStop, Ryan went from kind of an activist investor to a sitting chairman to the CEO of the company. So, he progressed through it, which is which is actually pretty impressive.

[00:14:04]>> That's the goal most people want to do, right?

[00:14:06]>> I I would think so. I mean, he's he's definitely good at advancing inside of a company.

[00:14:10]>> Along with that, he's oversaw a lot of the leadership changes. He raised, as we said previously, billions of dollars in capital.

[00:14:18]He reduced their store base, so he made less stores open, making them stores, I would assume, more profitable.

[00:14:24]And he also looked at cutting the costs.

[00:14:27]>> I think that's one of his like claims to fame is he's very good at coming in and cutting out the fat. Like, he cut a lot of a lot of waste. And looking at all that, you can't say that that's not nothing. I mean, there's something there. Unfortunately for Ryan, the balance sheet of GameStop does not speak quite as glowingly about his tenure there as the operational transformation does.

[00:14:47]>> There were multiple years of sales that went down. Their footprint, obviously, if they were, you know, shutting down stores, got smaller.

[00:14:55]>> They launched an NFT program. Basically, basically a digital marketplace where they were selling a picture of Groot or something. Like, it was an NFT marketplace, which actually is pretty important to this conversation because the NFT marketplace that they attempted to launch was actually the first experience that I was able to find, and the only experience I was able to find that would speak to Ryan's ability to run an actual marketplace where sellers were the customers selling to other people. This is the most probably like eBay thing and it actually died. It it never it never matured and never made any good income. So, remember the NFT thing. It's actually important to the conversation.

[00:15:31]>> So, early on he did some expansion with GameStop, but then later on as he was in there they reduced that.

[00:15:38]>> So, if you look at the public filings for GameStop, which we did, we downloaded them. We'll probably put some of that stuff in the links below, but the public filings don't really show a durable organic growth record for GameStop. I mean, it just doesn't. I Like you have to give him credit because it has started to come back and he did end up in a profitable stance with GameStop in 2025.

[00:15:57]>> So, are you saying that he raised more money and spent more money more of other people's money than growing it organically?

[00:16:03]>> I I mean, GameStop had the whole weird stock meme crap going on where they did they made billions from that. Like there was a lot of money coming in, so he was able to do a lot of what he did at Chewy and throw money at problems. The cool thing about GameStop is it looks like he actually learned some lessons from it and had to kind of tighten things up a little bit where there wasn't as much of that money that he could just freely use to to throw problems and he started actually being a better operator, fixing things, and it has kind of turned around and started to come back up. 2025 as I said actually made a profit.

[00:16:38]So, it's turning around, but this doesn't exactly show a long history of like I don't superstar CEO power here. It shows a history of a CEO who's growing and learning.

[00:16:50]>> Mhm.

[00:16:50]>> Smart CEO, innovative CEOs. You can say a lot of good things about Ryan, but I think the the primary thing to say about him in the context of what we're doing here talking about taking the purchasing eBay is that he's he's a growing and learning CEO.

[00:17:05]He's not what I would call seasoned. Not that my opinion means anything to Ryan Cohen, but the record speaks for itself.

[00:17:13]And here's actually where where that where Ryan's is about some of this on his own. Take a look.

[00:17:18]>> Now I got myself uh into a really interesting situation with GameStop. You know, we've turned around the business. It was really It's a shitty business, and we turned it into a business that now is making money.

[00:17:32]>> GameStop is now a safer, more profitable company, but they still need to be able to go beyond, you know, cutting cutting expenses. They need to go beyond raising more cash. And um >> the interest income that they're making.

[00:17:46]>> All right. So, by all accounts, this looks to be much more of a GameStop deal than an eBay deal to us.

[00:17:51]>> Listening to Ryan talk about why eBay and GameStop belong together.

[00:17:55]>> We belong together.

[00:17:58]>> bringing up the same [laughter] He keeps bringing up the same things.

[00:18:01]>> Yes. So, you know, collectibles is a big market. Cards are big market.

[00:18:05]Refurbished electronics are big market.

[00:18:08]Um the game using the GameStop stores, GameStop authentication, live selling, and lastly, digital gaming items.

[00:18:16]>> If you take that, just pull it out of that context. Just just take it all by itself and look at that list.

[00:18:22]>> That's >> That looks a lot more like a a GameStop shopping list than it does an eBay improvement list. Here's some footage of Ryan actually talking about some of this.

[00:18:31]>> There is significant overlap in the categories where GameStop is having a lot of success in collectibles, trading cards, and refurbished tech. And I'm fascinated by the category, and we're doing very well in it.

[00:18:48]And a big portion of our business is used product. And so, there is just this a ton of natural overlap between the two businesses. eBay has what GameStop could benefit from and vice versa.

[00:19:01]>> So, one of the pitches for this eBay GameStop thing going on right now is that these two companies can actually help each other. So, we wanted to explore that a little bit and see what each company actually brings to the table. Now, with eBay, they're they're bringing a a gigantic seller base.

[00:19:15]They're bringing buyer traffic. They're bringing a payment system. They're bringing eBay search and search traffic from Google cuz they're well-established. They're bringing their advertising, which they already do, and there's an argument for whether or not they do it well. [laughter] >> will say they don't advertise eBay.

[00:19:29]>> But, it's in place, and I don't think anybody can argue it's not effective.

[00:19:31]You could pretty probably argue that that they could make it more efficient, but nobody could argue it's not effective. And they bring a profitable cash flow to the table.

[00:19:39]>> So, what does GameStop bring? They bring their physical stores.

[00:19:44]Um they bring a pile of cash. I wrote that on there. Pile of cash. And they bring a need for a bigger story for GameStop.

[00:19:51]>> And I mean, objectively, this is this is not even objectively [laughter] eBay is bringing a lot more to the table than GameStop is bringing to the table.

[00:20:00]And And I love Ryan's confidence, but confidence doesn't run companies. So, this this list is not even in our eyes.

[00:20:06]Now, I will say I can't prove Ryan wakes up in the morning and says, "Man, I'm I need to put GameStop first. I'm going to use eBay and and ring out what I can get out of it and make GameStop better."

[00:20:15]That's not what we're saying here, and it's not something we could prove even if we were saying it. But, we can prove something.

[00:20:21]>> We can prove that Ryan is the CEO of GameStop. He is also a major shareholder in GameStop and has the intention of using GameStop assets to go along with eBay.

[00:20:30]>> So, just on human human logic here, well, maybe not even human logic. I mean, I think even a monkey could see this.

[00:20:37]>> infer.

[00:20:37]>> you could reasonably infer that advancing GameStock is in Ryan's best interest.

[00:20:42]>> it, too.

[00:20:43]>> [laughter] >> GameStock GameStop. I don't know why we say GameStock.

[00:20:46]>> Cuz we're just talking about stock shareholder stock.

[00:20:48]>> Advancing GameStock is in Ryan's best interest here, and I think the evidence points that way more than it points to I really want to be uh like I really want to help eBay, and GameStop could could do that. I don't see that.

[00:21:02]Like, I know he says it. The evidence points pretty clearly, or at least very reasonably, for you to say it it looks like this would be more beneficial for Ryan and GameStop than the other way around.

[00:21:14]>> Yeah, and traditional sellers like Corey and I and a lot of you that are watching might benefit from something, but that's not the first beneficiary. We're not the first ones that are going to that are going to benefit. GameStop and eBay merger or whatever you want to buy out.

[00:21:27]>> We're not even sure we would benefit from this. I I can't say that this would all be bad for traditional sellers, but right now what I'm seeing is it's not necessarily going to be all good and may actually be a net negative for just normal sellers. All right, now we need to talk about the authentication pitch that Ryan keeps bringing up in these interviews.

[00:21:45]>> His idea is to use all of the eBay or all of the the GameStop locations, centers, hubs, whatever you want to call the stores, um as authentication hubs for all of the stuff that goes and needs authentication.

[00:21:59]>> Which sounds like a really cool idea when you consider there's there's GameStop businesses or buildings all over the country.

[00:22:07]And then you realize eBay already does this. And not only do they already do it, they do it really well and it's pretty much hands-off and transparent and super easy for us as it is.

[00:22:18]>> eBay's um authentication warehouses or whatever sites have a lot of people that work in them that know certain products.

[00:22:25]So, are they going to train GameStop employees to know every single category on eBay?

[00:22:29]>> It's highly unlikely they would >> I doubt it.

[00:22:32]>> have to spread the expertise out across the country, which means if you did bring it into your local one and there didn't happen to be an antique samurai sword expert there, he would have to send it to another spot as opposed to just using eBay's authentication that already functions as it's supposed to.

[00:22:48]You just send it in and they bring the guy in to to do things. So, it's it's kind of reinventing the wheel when you have a perfectly good wheel, but making the wheel shittier.

[00:22:57]>> I heard him also say that he wants to use the GameStop stores as logistics or fulfillment hubs to ship out your stuff. Drop it off, they do all the stuff for it and then out the door goes.

[00:23:09]>> And I don't know if I'm understanding this right, but if that is what they're implying and I think it is from what I've seen, then essentially they're just adding an additional step for what we already do. Now instead of doing things here and packaging them and shipping them after we list them and sell them, now we we got to go drop off at the post office, then we got to swing by GameStop.

[00:23:28]It I mean essentially what he's creating is a post office where you have to walk by a row of Funko Pops to drop off your packages. And and it just doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

[00:23:38]>> The founder of your show was uh was talking about his Montblanc pen and like that's a good example. That's a a perfect item to go and buy on eBay, but you're always concerned uh that is it going to be real and the trust. And that's something that using GameStop's 1,600 stores, we can immediately authenticate that item. The seller can ship it or we can ship it, but we've got 1,600 access points that we can do live authentication. We can go deep in collectibles leveraging our physical infrastructure. We can increase uh intake by bringing a lot more product onto the platform. And then there's a lot of other categories that I can I can grow in.

[00:24:26]>> Along with this, it brings a whole set of new questions that, you know, right now with eBay you don't have to worry about um because they are responsible for a lot of it. But who's liable or who's liable for the product after you drop it off at GameStop?

[00:24:37]>> Who decides the condition? If I'm going to bring a product there and have you list it and and handle it like a 3PO, basically you're you're my logistics company, who decides the condition of that product? And if it's if it's you guys or or if it's us, what happens if we disagree on that? How does that resolve?

[00:24:55]>> What happens if GameStop loses your package?

[00:24:57]>> Yeah, again, that the liability, do they stand behind it? If I have my receipt says I drop it off, does GameStop eat that? Now, I want to be fair here to Ryan. He has a kissed He has a history.

[00:25:09]He has a history of kind of going over the top with great customer service. I would have to assume in this situation he'd stand behind the customer, but it's a question. It's a question we would have. And probably the most important thing, you're going to make me go to the post office and you're going to make me go to GameStop to drop to use the new logistics you have. Does that mean I have to wait in line behind a meth head trying to sell his Xbox handles before I could get my stuff processed? Because that doesn't sound like a process I would enjoy. I don't go into GameStops.

[00:25:38]>> I have been in one once.

[00:25:41]>> We're not gamers. We're not really of Like we're not your customer base.

[00:25:45]That's not a store we go into. It's not an atmosphere we would enjoy. I don't And And I'm not implying that all customers at GameStop are meth heads.

[00:25:52]>> No.

[00:25:53]>> But it's not our scene and it's not a store I would want to go into and stand in a line to do the business that I was already doing here perfectly fine.

[00:26:01]>> So, my question though is going back to the using the GameStop stores as logistics and fulfillment hubs. Is that like you list it, you give it to them, and they take care of it from there on?

[00:26:11]Or is it you give it to them, they do the listing, they do the shipping, and you just get the money?

[00:26:16]>> I don't know. [laughter] It's Honestly, it's unclear and I'm not sure, but either way that goes, these are kind of the questions we would have.

[00:26:24]I think some of the answers could be satisfied in a in a way that we would be happy with. But the the fact of the matter is we don't know. So, we have to question this because this is our livelihood that's being kind of tossed around in the internet world. You know, basically Ryan's making the tour to to drum up support for for his side so that he can take over eBay and it's kind of all of our livelihoods >> It is.

[00:26:46]>> that are that are kind of the center of that hurricane. So, we have to ask these kind of questions. All right, so let's talk about something else we keep hearing Ryan say in these interviews, and that is him talking about this this digital gaming aspect that he wants to bring to eBay.

[00:27:01]So, we need to talk about digital digital gaming assets, and a little bit about NFTs, which GameStop knows a thing or two about.

[00:27:08]>> In regards to NFTs, GameStop did try an NFT marketplace. They found out very quickly that it was not a profitable market to be in, and I would say they failed, but everybody else says they just wound it down as a non-profitable piece of their business.

[00:27:23]>> Now, that's actually really important a really important aspect to this conversation, because the NFT marketplace that they tried at GameStop was actually the closest thing Ryan has ever done that I'm aware of that I found to what eBay is. It was an actual marketplace where sellers got on and tried to sell to buyers. They were managing that marketplace. And in this example, it didn't turn out great. So, not only in the digital assets, which were the NFTs, but in the marketplace aspect, there's no history of Ryan ever making any of that work. In fact, there's history of him trying to make it work and having to wind it down as unprofitable. So, it's an important part of the conversation. He did talk about this someone in an interview, and I'm going to share a clip with you here on that.

[00:28:06]>> And this is something that I have not spoken about before publicly, but eBay today is the leader in physical items, physical collectibles as an example. And so, I would extend the that into digital collectibles. And essentially, if you look at all of these in-game items, AAA titles that people are accumulating, skins, weapons, all of these things, taking eBay and building a marketplace where you can provide the for in-game digital items. Essentially, it's what NFTs could have, people thought they were, but ultimately they had no real utility.

[00:28:57]In-game items actually have real utility. And if you look at all of these collectibles, frankly, they're an ego play. You own art, like, what is that?

[00:29:07]The end of the day, it's an ego play.

[00:29:11]But if you look at in-game digital items, there's no market place that is providing liquidity for them. And so, I would use eBay to uh to provide liquidity for in-game digital items. And I believe that addressable market is significantly larger than uh could be much larger than eBay's marketplace on physical items.

[00:29:37]And no one's doing it. And And this should already exist. And it's kind of it like it's crazy that it doesn't exist.

[00:29:43]>> Let's talk about some of the problems that there are with a digital market, digital gaming, in-game asset um marketplace. The big one that I think of is um they don't control the game system platforms. They don't control the Trying to think of like the game manufacturers.

[00:29:59]They don't control any of that. So, they have no say so in it.

[00:30:02]They also A lot of it it's against their terms of service.

[00:30:06]>> Yeah, they're They're basically saying, "Let's go sell stuff that's not tangible. You can't touch it. It's not a real product. Let's sell non-tangible stuff that we don't own and have no rights to to people who also can't legally buy it because it automatically breaks terms of service at many of these manufacturers and creators. So, Microsoft, Sony PlayStation, they actually have terms of service that prohibit this exact thing, that you can't sell in-game assets out of game.

[00:30:34]So, it brings up the question, does he know something we don't know? Maybe.

[00:30:38]That's a It could be. Maybe he he access to Sony or Microsoft or some of these game developers and he's already started making relationships where they say, "You know what? Nobody on the freaking planet Earth can sell in-game assets because it's it's strictly against our policy, but Ryan's a good guy. We'll let him do it. Maybe he has that relationship."

[00:30:59]>> I don't know. I I always question this whole piece just because it's a it's a non-tangible, intangible, however you want to word it. Like what recourses do any buyers have if they don't get the item, you know, it goes into a whole 'nother list of problems that that this kind of a marketplace would bring.

[00:31:14]>> To be clear, why one of the reasons I don't think he has the ear of those game manufacturers and console manufacturers.

[00:31:20]One of the reasons that I find that unlikely in this instance is because if he actually had the ear of those manufacturers and those console people and the video game industry, I I would think that they would not be doing something right now in today's world that's actually winding down GameStop and making it a completely irrelevant business by taking away physical copies of video games. They're actually pulling those out of the market, which in sent in a sense kind of tanks his entire current business model. That's not all GameStop does. They do other things, but it's it's freaking GameStop. It's not used electronic shop. It's GameStop. It's a huge portion of their market and when they take away physical copies of games and that's beginning to happen now, if he had their ear and they're like, "Yeah, you you could do that. You could sell our stuff that we don't let nobody else sell." You would think he would probably leverage that to Jesus, guys, like I only sell your games. It's one of my main selling items. You're going to shut my business down. You would think he'd use that that leverage there.

[00:32:25]>> That's not ridiculous. That's not ridiculous to say that.

[00:32:28]>> I don't know. Maybe one day he'll decide he needs to go buy Sony PlayStation or Microsoft.

[00:32:33]>> That'd be actually kind of cool.

[00:32:34][laughter] I'd actually be behind that.

[00:32:36]I think I think he would benefit that a lot more than he would eBay.

[00:32:39]>> I don't know.

[00:32:40]>> So, here's the last question of this section here is if Ryan was was actually capable of creating an in-game digital asset market, why has GameStop not done it?

[00:32:51]>> Yep.

[00:32:51]>> eBay's not a video game store primarily, but I know I know a guy that is.

[00:32:56]>> Well, yeah. I mean, if if they knew all the backgrounds, I mean, taking over eBay, granted they might have some funding, um but couldn't he use the funding he was planning on putting towards purchase of eBay to do what to do the game thing?

[00:33:08]>> I don't think funding is ever a problem for Ryan. I think that's one of his skill core like skills that he has is he's really good at getting other people to give him their money to spend it on his business. So, it's like raising funds and venture capital and these kind of things, this is Ryan's domain where he's really really good at. I think you see him on all these interviews on like he's hitting CNBC, he's hitting the podcast, he's hitting all kinds of interviews. And I don't think that's because he's trying to put us at ease. I don't think he's trying to reach out to the sellers and say "It's going to be okay, guys. I'm on your side." I think that's horse [ __ ] That's not what's happening.

[00:33:45]>> You think he's raising money?

[00:33:46]>> I think he's raising money. [laughter] I think he is. I think the right people that have the kind of money to chip in and do something like this kind of takeover that he has to do now, I think those people watch the episodes of the CNBC podcasts and things like that and they're like, "You know what?

[00:34:01]We'll chip in." I think that's what he's doing. He's very good at it. And I think he's out there just trying to raise money so that and to be clear, we'll sum this up later on, but I think this is Ryan going to get eBay? I think he is. I think it's going to happen.

[00:34:15]Just maybe not the way we all like that it's going to happen, but I think it is going to happen. We'll talk about that later. All right. So, this section we need to talk about the fact that live selling is not eBay. And this is something that I see Ryan pitching over and over and over again is he can grab a much larger market share and he can expand eBay by really getting in and and digging in on the live selling.

[00:34:36]>> So, I will point out this real quick before we get into it. I was watching something earlier about live selling, and somebody was talking about it, and there was like five to 10 people in in the shows that were showing up on eBay's live. So, I don't think it's as big of a thing, but he keeps pitching it that it needs to be bigger, bigger, bigger, and needs to take a big piece.

[00:34:54]>> I don't think the amount of people in eBay's shows right now is really an indicator of anything cuz I think they're doing live selling poorly. But, I will say that live selling does work for certain things, like cards and collectibles and Funko Pops and and things like fashion, things like that.

[00:35:09]Live selling does have a place, and and we've done live selling. Far be it from us to say live selling doesn't have a place, but I don't think it could be stressed enough that eBay is not live selling. The The what makes eBay work, the the core of what eBay is, is that I can get on there and search for that old lawnmower part or the old car part to restore an old Chevy. And and it's a static selling platform for normal people of used goods.

[00:35:37]Putting live selling in there brings a whole plethora of new problems.

[00:35:40]>> But, one thing that we missed, who else really likes live selling?

[00:35:44]>> I don't know.

[00:35:45]>> The people who get to hear, "LET'S GO, CHAT. BID IT UP, CHAT. BID IT UP, CHAT."

[00:35:49]EVERY 5 seconds.

[00:35:50]>> It's just freaking weird.

[00:35:51]>> I hate it.

[00:35:52]>> I'll show you some of the parts where Ryan actually talks about live selling.

[00:35:55]>> Number one is live commerce, and there's a large competitor that is completely crushing it, and eBay has the users.

[00:36:05]eBay has the brands. They have a platform, but the platform sucks for a lot of different reasons, and they don't have the content creators on the platform, and nobody even really knows eBay live exists. There's like an application process. I talked to sellers, and they're telling me like they have applied to be to be a seller, and they are waiting to get approved. It's like they're basically stopping themselves from being successful and getting content creators onto the platform. And then the entire back end of eBay Live also sucks. So, live commerce, the TAM is like a 400 billion. It's growing very quickly in the US. It's very popular in Asia. And eBay Live should be significantly larger. They should be the category leader in the space. And they have like at max a few hundred people basically watching watching their sales. So, that's a huge huge growth opportunity for them to start doing really well in live commerce.

[00:37:04]>> There is a certain demographic out there that likes to hop in and watch that hype guy or that entertainer get on there and and and hype up a used shirt and make it sell for more.

[00:37:16]It's an entertainment thing. So, there there's an audience for it. But that's again, I can't I don't even know that you could say this enough times. That is not eBay. eBay is for the guy selling that old carburetor, that old lawnmower part. And more more importantly, it's for the guy that needs to find it.

[00:37:33]There're always going to be a static search to eBay or there there should always be because that's what made eBay successful. That's why it's hung on so long is because of the type of things it sells and how it sells them. And I think live selling probably dilutes that and causes some issues.

[00:37:50]>> Some of the problems that live selling would add to eBay is pressure buying, everybody thinking they have to buy everything that's on there. Um a lot of people I think have buyers remorse. I mean, we get that now every once in a while for buyers remorse.

[00:38:01]>> I think those two kind of go together.

[00:38:02]If you're in an auction and you don't want to lose that item and it's a fast thing, that pressure buying causes buyers remorse.

[00:38:09]>> People also on lives put in their or give sloppy condition calls. Like they're telling you that this is in great condition, but they forget to tell you turn it over and show you the big hole in the back. Combined shipping can be a mess when you're getting into live selling if you don't keep track of what everybody's selling.

[00:38:23]>> It also brings on a whole new level of moderation that has to be done on eBay.

[00:38:27]And and probably the biggest one of all of these problems, it it kind of turns the sellers into performers. In order to make live selling work, you really have to be a performer, and it becomes it it it'll basically turn eBay into looking a little bit more like Netflix than it does a used platform or used marketplace for goods.

[00:38:46]Because you're going to have to have that that performance aspect to it. And it That's just something that I think pulls at the soul of eBay, and it just it just slowly rots it from the inside out.

[00:38:56]>> That's not us.

[00:38:58]We are not performers. But it also has if if you're a current eBay seller, you've seen a lot of people complain about it. It turns net or eBay's homepage into what looks like Netflix with all the lives going on.

[00:39:10]>> It does, and I and I think part of why that happens is because live selling is a huge market. So is the the NASA space program, but but that's not eBay's field. They're not going into that. But I think part of what makes that kind of turn into that Netflix feel or that entertainment hub instead of eBay is that eBay is now chasing entertainment metrics. They have to to make live selling work. It's It's the new world QVC. You're You're trying to get in there and hook those old ladies or those young kids to just impulse buy and become hoarders, and that's kind of how live selling works.

[00:39:43]>> ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?

[00:39:45]ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?

[00:39:49]>> [music] >> IS THIS NOT WHY YOU ARE HERE?

[00:39:51]>> AND I THINK chasing those metrics really takes away from what already makes eBay great and why a lot of people, us included, really already love eBay. If we get right down to brass tacks here, we could do one final check on this to answer would Ryan Cohen actually be good for eBay for the common seller, the normal guys like you and me, the everyday static sellers. And I think we could do that by answering one question.

[00:40:14]If we ran a business and we had to leave for 5 years, would we hand Ryan Cohen our checkbook and say "Handle it."

[00:40:21]Could we trust him with our finances to run our business while we were gone?

[00:40:27]And the answer might actually surprise you.

[00:40:29]>> Some things we can trust Ryan to do if he had to run our business, he would find any waste that we currently had and be able to get rid of it. And he would make lazy executives, which you we all know there are, he would make them very uncomfortable for there whether they get to keep their job or not.

[00:40:44]>> Hang on, who are the executives in this question? [laughter] Ryan, I'm pleading for my job. In this in this instance, we are the lazy executive.

[00:40:53]>> I think he would listen harder to sellers. I know in some of the one the podcast that he's done that were related to reseller um like who was the one Justin?

[00:41:00]>> Justin's.

[00:41:01]>> Um he talked about how he'd like to help, you know, fight for or help out the sellers versus just the buyers.

[00:41:07]>> A lot of people say that's just lip service and and it's easy to say and hard to do.

[00:41:13]But Ryan's record with Chewy and the customer service he he kind of put his money where his mouth is with the customer service. So while yeah, maybe it's lip service while you don't own eBay, you can say [ __ ] like that. I actually kind of believe Ryan in this case. I do think he would he does I do think he sees the seller as the customer and I think he would focus in on that.

[00:41:35]>> Do you really think he would? Because I mean without buyers there is no eBay.

[00:41:39]>> Buyers come where the sellers are. Where there where there's inventory, the buyers will come as long as you treat them right. So I think I think Ryan would handle the seller thing even though there's no proof behind that and a lot of people do call it kind of lip service, I do think he would he would handle business in this department.

[00:41:53]>> he would also find things that were not working at eBay and cut them out or learn how to fix them or whatever to make them work the way they should.

[00:42:02]>> But I would still not hand him a signed check and let him run my company for 5 years and there's a very important reasons why I absolutely wouldn't. And the first among those is that while he demonstrated that with other people's money he could build Chewy to be something really cool and amazing, he did not do it profitably. And as a small business owner for us, there's no such thing as running in the red for years. Like >> [laughter] >> if I have $10, you can't spend 11.

[00:42:26]That's not the way a checkbook works. So would I give him my checkbook just based on Chewy alone? Absolutely not.

[00:42:32]>> And with GameStop, he showed that he can definitely raise the funds to be able to spend. He can shrink the business by making it work the way it should, but he did not create a profitable engine to make the business run by itself.

[00:42:47]>> Yeah. And we'll put an asterisk here.

[00:42:48]We'll give it We'll put a caveat in here and say that we have to give him a little credit where credit's due because as we discussed earlier, there is some growth showing now and he is kind of on track to grow that to where he broke into the profit in 2025. But remember we said in the last segment, Sony just jerked the rug out of GameStop's feet and said, "Hey, we're ending digital or physical media."

[00:43:10]So there might be a little panic there. I'm not sure. And even Ryan in one of the clips previous that you've already seen said GameStop was kind of a crappy business that he kind of turned around.

[00:43:22]So there's We'll give him credit where credit's due, but I still he hasn't proven he could turn this into a really profitable thing. You can't say I failed because the business I ran was [ __ ] If you're running it, it's on you.

[00:43:34]>> The NFT marketplace. I don't think we have to talk about this. We're just going to say fail.

[00:43:39]>> Enough said.

[00:43:40]>> [laughter] >> Enough said.

[00:43:42]>> Now the whole drop-off idea for logistics and and I I think it was an optional drop-off if you want to drop it off, but the whole drop-off idea in general actually demonstrates a use for those GameStop stores, which I think are actually in trouble right now.

[00:43:57]But it doesn't really do anything for ordinary sellers. For one, if we're if you're a serious seller and you're doing this like we are, we're we're very small scale compared to a a of sellers.

[00:44:05]>> Mhm. not going to drop [ __ ] off at GameStop. We're if anything, we're we'll get to a point where we'll have a mail container out here and the post office could swing out with a box truck to pick it up every day. We're dang sure not going to take extra trips >> 45 minutes >> to some GameStop [laughter] store. That just That's just not going to happen.

[00:44:22]>> And as far as live selling, like I said, like Corey said earlier, we have tried it, we've done it. It's great for influencers or content creators, create whatever, but it actually sucks for anybody that is trying to sell the stuff that's needed, that's long-tail, that you don't know you need it today, but in 5 months you might need it.

[00:44:39]>> And one of the biggest reasons I wouldn't hand Ryan my checkbook to run my business and walk away for 5 years is because some of the simple finance questions that he's been asked about how in the hell are you going to purchase eBay when you don't have the money? We know you don't have the money. How are you going to purchase eBay? And there's several ways to do it. I mean, I think the world sees that, but the answers that he gives are always kind of vague and cryptic and and that would probably be one of the main re- Like, if I ask you about my checkbook and I want to know how you're going to do something with the money, kind of important that it's not a vague answer. Here's an example of what I'm talking about.

[00:45:12]>> The audience, and I know a lot of people are going to ask, "How does the math math for you?"

[00:45:17]Given the price tag, $56 billion, given the market cap of GameStop, which is a fraction of that. I I know you have this $20 billion um financing letter from TD, but sort of walk us through how how you could get to that price and how it would work.

[00:45:36]>> It's on our website. It's half uh cash, half stock, uh but but the details are are on our website.

[00:45:45]>> Can you help I I I've read them, but can you help our audience understand them?

[00:45:49]>> Yeah, what what which part exactly?

[00:45:52]>> Well, I think we can start with the idea that the market cap of GameStop is, call it, $11 billion. dollars.

[00:46:01]Uh you have $9 uh on your balance sheet.

[00:46:05]Arguably, if you're if you're providing uh effectively all of your stock and then and then the cash that gets you to 20, you have this letter from TD. That's another 20.

[00:46:17]Uh we're now at 40, uh but we're still off uh by call it uh 16.

[00:46:24]And and the 20, as far as I understand, while it's considered a highly confident letter, meaning TD's saying they're highly confident uh that they would provide the financing, it's not locked financing.

[00:46:35]>> Yeah, we'll see what happens.

[00:46:36]>> I I I hear you.

[00:46:38]I understand that. I'm I'm just trying to understand where the the rest of the money would come from.

[00:46:43]>> It's half cash, half stock.

[00:46:45]>> I I I'm I hear you. I'm just saying that that math doesn't get you to the to the price that you're offering.

[00:46:52]>> Right, and that's a pretty straightforward question. I don't get it.

[00:46:55]>> [laughter] >> Like, where's the rest of the money coming from?

[00:46:59]Andrew laid it out pretty clearly.

[00:47:02]>> I I don't understand your question.

[00:47:03]We're offering half cash, half stock, and we have the ability to issue stock in order to get the deal done.

[00:47:10]>> Now, I think I we know why it's a vague answer, and maybe we'll dig more into that here in the conclusion section coming up next, but I think the reason it's a vague answer is because, frankly, he has no idea. The Like, he doesn't know for sure yet. He understands what he has to do in terms of raising funds.

[00:47:28]But, he can't say like part of this is coming from investor XYZ because he probably doesn't have those investors yet. He's out there trolling the internet for investors currently, and so he can't give you a real clear answer on this I'm going to write the check because I have the money from XYZ and whatever.

[00:47:46]He doesn't. He's He's still gathering that.

[00:47:48]>> Mhm. He's out there >> I think that's why they're vague.

[00:47:51]>> He's out there pimping for it.

[00:47:52]>> Now, I could be completely wrong. This is one part of the video where we get into speculation a little bit. I don't have proof to back these up. The rest of the video has been pretty much spot-on in the facts. This is where we break into the speculation a little bit. So, all right. So, the final verdict here, would Ryan Cohen actually be good for eBay in terms of just normal ordinary sellers like us? And I think the answer at the moment is largely no, but there is some good news.

[00:48:15]>> I think Ryan would help a lot with forcing change, which is good for eBay.

[00:48:18]>> It'd be top-notch for seller service.

[00:48:20]>> Yes. Yes.

[00:48:21]>> And as And as far as the back office of eBay goes, I think he would be a really good force to throw in there just for the sake of account accountability and cost discipline. I think Ryan would would thrive in that environment and help eBay out a lot. But, >> based on what he repeatedly talks about in all these interviews that he's done, I don't think or we don't think that traditional sellers like Corey and I and a lot of you that are watching are going to benefit from this deal at all.

[00:48:47]>> I think the primary benefit the primary beneficiary here would be GameStop. And I'm not saying that's a horrible thing.

[00:48:54]That's capitalism. If GameStop buys eBay, they should probably be the primary beneficiary. But, I do think GameStop has the most to gain. And And I think we're on kind of the dirty end of that scratching stick when it comes to this deal. I don't think normal sellers like us are going to like what comes from this change from what we're seeing.

[00:49:13]>> They both bring a lot to the table.

[00:49:14]However, I would not say that they are even on the sides of what each person brings.

[00:49:19]>> No, when it comes to eBay and GameStop, they're pretending that they're uh you know, these these two equal peers coming to the table to one's going to buy the other and they're going to join up and they're going to make the world a better place. It I mean, this is an ant walking up to a mountain and saying, "I want to own the top piece of your mountain." It's just It's not an equal thing. Now, >> David and Goliath.

[00:49:40]>> It It's kind of a David and Goliath, except [laughter] for David gets to borrow ladders from everyone in the community.

[00:49:46]Like it's a really weird thing. The whole venture capital thing scares the bejeebers out of me. Like I don't understand all of it. I don't have to, cuz I don't do it currently. But, it's not it's not an even playing field. And I will say that I do think Ryan is probably going to get this deal through. I think he's I think he's going to make it happen, and here's why.

[00:50:05]eBay is a publicly traded company, and as with any publicly traded company, if you have enough money, you could buy it.

[00:50:12]End of story. And there's one thing Ryan's really freaking good at doing.

[00:50:16]>> Getting money.

[00:50:17]>> Getting money from other people.

[00:50:19]That's So, can he get the money to take over eBay? He already has of today owns 10%.

[00:50:25]>> He owns 10% of eBay?

[00:50:27]>> They own 10%. GameStop owns 10% now. So, can he get enough money to get a controlling share in eBay? I think it's just a matter of time. So, I think it's going to happen, and our only hope is Ryan watches interviews like this and says, "Well, maybe he's got a good point, and maybe some of these things are retarded." And I don't know if that's going to happen, but I can hope.

[00:50:45]>> I don't think [laughter] Ryan's going to watch our show, but I don't know. I I I would probably cry like a little [ __ ] And you can't deny, the truth is, eBay has problems. Everybody will complain about it. Everybody knows they have problems. But, without eBay, GameStop doesn't necessarily have a future.

[00:51:02]>> No, and I think that's what's I think this is a Hail Mary for Ryan. I I really do. I I think it's a Hail Mary because he's smart enough to see the writing on the wall. When physical media starts dropping, and that's his core business model, >> Mhm.

[00:51:15]>> then what what is GameStop going to do?

[00:51:17]It's already a struggling company that's starting to turn the corner and come back. And just as you start kind of coming back into the pack, and it looks like you might be able to start doing well, >> Sony says, "Uh-uh."

[00:51:27]>> Sony says, just kicks you right in the gonads. So, what are you going to do? I mean, parachute out of this, get rid of it while you can, and save what you can, or take the Hail Mary pass, acquire eBay, and turn this into something just huge and and great. And and I do think it could be huge and great. I just think the current things he's pointing out and talking about are largely hogwash in terms of what makes eBay eBay right now. I I think it steals the soul of eBay if he goes through with half of what he's talking about.

[00:51:59]>> Yep.

[00:52:00]>> I can only hope that when he gets in there, he looks around and he's like, "Oh, that's what eBay is. I don't want to [ __ ] that up." And that's the best I can hope.

[00:52:08]>> Before we get on board with this, before we say we support this, we have four questions that need to be answered in order for us to support this.

[00:52:16]>> Well, we have four questions that we hope can be [laughter] answered.

[00:52:19]You're under no obligation to answer us.

[00:52:23]>> We need answers now. Okay, the first one is what gets better for ordinary static listings? Like, what changes? Is there any changes for static listings?

[00:52:34]>> Again, if I'm selling lawnmower parts and they're just static listings, nobody's coming into a live. I don't care how entertaining entertaining I am.

[00:52:41]I could put on a two-piece bikini and get in there and jog and yell hey, chat with the best of them. I ain't going to sell any freaking lawnmower blades to people. It's not how it works. And that's what eBay is. So, for for us, for stuff like that, what gets better for us? I see a lot of things that would get worse. If you fill the home page with all that live [ __ ] like they eBay has done a couple of times.

[00:53:02]>> They're currently doing that.

[00:53:03]>> Every time they do that, our sales dip for normal ordinary sellers. Because the user logs on to their app or to the web page and it looks like freaking Netflix.

[00:53:12]It doesn't look like eBay and our sales dip.

[00:53:15]Yeah. Good.

[00:53:16]>> [laughter] >> Good example.

[00:53:17]>> Oh my gosh, I just kept scrolling and there's a crap ton of them. So, the next piece, the next question that I think deserves an answer is what makes GameStop's authentication program better than what eBay currently has?

[00:53:29]>> Yeah, I don't I don't see this. This is I don't see the argument here where we could I I see an argument from Ryan's standpoint where I have all these freaking locations and I have to justify having all these freaking locations.

[00:53:43]>> Mhm.

[00:53:43]>> Let's figure out a way to make them work if we buy eBay. Great. That doesn't mean it's good. I mean, yeah, you get to keep all locations, you found a use for them, you save some money, you maybe extend the life of those locations for GameStop. How do they help eBay? Because their authentication program at eBay is already pretty freaking good.

[00:54:02]>> Mhm.

[00:54:02]>> And it's so painless and transparent to us, we don't even know when we're using it half the time.

[00:54:07]>> A lot of times you don't, unless I mean, besides getting the email from them that saying, "Hey, your thing passed authentication." I mean, we drop it to an address, we don't look at where it's going. We do look at where it's going, don't get me wrong. But, we don't pay attention to it. Once it goes to authentication, unless we get the email saying it was declined or >> Yeah, it's hands-off.

[00:54:23]>> I don't I don't do anything with it.

[00:54:25]>> All right, so this is the big one. Ryan, if you're listening, I'd be really interested in this answer.

[00:54:29]>> [laughter] >> Why has a game business, like like literally a video game business, if you wanted to start a digital in-game asset marketplace, why has a game business not done this already? Why is GameStop not piloting this? Why have they not done it in the past? And the answer to that question might be really revealing to whether or not you should even be thinking about it going forward.

[00:54:52]>> Mhm.

[00:54:52]>> Again, this this sounds really stupid.

[00:54:54]It sounds like I'm giving Ryan Cohen advice. I'm not qualified. I want to put that in here as many times as possible.

[00:55:00]I'm not qualified, but it is a question I have. Just from the peon view, I'm like, you're talking about doing a digital video like in-game video asset marketplace if you buy eBay and you own a video game business. It's absolute insanity to me that that is even a conversation.

[00:55:16]>> And lastly, the question we have is what part of any piece of what we've talked about today or his plan helps sellers like Corey and I, and you guys, I have to include you guys because you're watching and a lot of you are sellers just like us, um that are not into cards or games or entertainment or live shows, what part of this plan helps us that are normal sellers?

[00:55:37]>> So far I'm not seeing >> Yeah, I'm not seeing I I will say like I would be excited to see Ryan Cohen get in there and say, you know what? I'm taking over customer service. Everybody out of the room. We're going to fix this. Like I That would be cool.

[00:55:50]>> [laughter] >> I think about it.

[00:55:52]>> We have differing opinions. Now I but I haven't done the research on it like Corey has. I mean I know enough of it, but from just what I've heard, I'm not a fan.

[00:56:01]>> All right, I think that's it. So our verdict for this is as an ordinary normal everyday Joe Blow seller out there, would this merger or would this acquisition by Ryan of eBay actually be good for us? Currently in the state it is now, I don't think so. I think it would be catastrophic for us.

[00:56:16]And there's just too many questions left. But I mean there's just too many.

[00:56:21]Am I opposed to GameStop and eBay coming together?

[00:56:25]Not necessarily, but if I was going to see that happen, I would almost much rather Ryan just put GameStop up for sale and let eBay buy it if they want it.

[00:56:32]Otherwise Otherwise, just close GameStop down and go join the board at eBay. You own enough stock. Keep buying more and go join the board and you can make changes from within.

[00:56:42]I don't know. I don't I don't see this being good for us though.

[00:56:45]All right, we're going to get out of here. Oh, before we go, we did get some pictures. We've got three of you guys getting God Tier tape coming out this week. It's already labeled, it'll be shipping today.

[00:56:55]>> Do we tell them who or are you just going to put pictures?

[00:56:58]>> Why don't you tell them who?

[00:56:59]>> We have Andy and Trish.

[00:57:01]They are getting some. Wes and Lisa are getting some. And AZ Cat Sue.

[00:57:06]>> And we are sending one extra roll out to Alex Beard King Picker because I saw his video and they were packing while they were recording the video and Alex, you have problems. I'm sending you some quiet tape. You get to experience the quality of God Tier tape. So it's on its way. And with that make sure you send us a picture for next week.

[00:57:24]>> us a picture. If you send us a picture, make sure you send your address with it so that if you happen to be one of the first ones to send it in, we have your address to send your tape out. Also, like, share, subscribe. Share with your friends.

[00:57:34]>> All right, we'll see you guys Saturday.

[00:57:36]>> Hasta la vista, baby.