why aren't all 8 resolved? a statement only gets an assessment when the public
record can support or contradict it. opinions and what-ifs never can, and 0 checkable
ones are still open, waiting for their date. predictions held up or didn't;
assertions are supported or contradicted. on every card:
▮▮▮▮▮ certainty ·
▮▮▮▮▮ debate potential. speakers are clickable
Disclosure
Ryan Cohen: Committing $500M of personal capital to eBay transaction
“I'm putting five hundred million of my own money into this transaction.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Friedberg: eBay and PayPal deals signal wave of legacy digital buyouts
“I think that eBay and PayPal are probably the beginning of a wave of mega deals of call it flaccid, you know, digital businesses. That can be revived. With the blue chew of capital and the right operator. Again, I think that there's probably a big wave of this…”
What-if
Ryan Cohen: eBay could have been Amazon
“EBay could have been Amazon.”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Cohen: $2B in costs can be immediately cut from eBay
“Number one is on immediately improving earnings through cutting costs. And Pulling two billion dollars of costs out of the business and on the operating base of, you know, close to five and a half billion of expenses and 2.4 billion spent on sales and marketin…”
Prediction Not checkable as stated
Cohen: In-game digital item market could exceed eBay physical market
“But if you look at in-game digital items, there's no marketplace that is providing liquidity for them. And so I would use eBay to provide liquidity for in-game digital items. And I believe that addressable market is significantly larger than could be much larg…”
Assertion Contradicted
Cohen: eBay CEO golden parachute is over $100M
“It's over a hundred million bucks.”
Assertion Supported
Cohen: eBay active users have dropped by 30 million since COVID
“I mean, if you just look at how they've done in the past since COVID, Every important metric is down. GMV is down. Active users is down by thirty million.”
Assertion Supported
Palihapitiya: Carl Icahn unlocked $250B in value by pushing eBay-PayPal split
“He unlocked a quarter trillion dollars of value.”