Bargain Hunters Continue Finding Great Deals on eBay This Cyber Monday

With purse strings tightened, shoppers nationwide scoured the Web on Cyber Monday in search of great deals, with many of the best values being found on eBay (Nasdaq:EBAY). On the day that typically kicks off the online holiday shopping season, eBay reported that hot items such as the Nintendo Wii Console¹, the most popular item on the site this season, was selling at an average price of $349. Savvy shoppers used cashback incentives from Microsoft Live to lower their total purchase price by as much as 30 percent. Additionally, eBay Inc. company PayPal saw a 27 percent increase in online payment volume on Cyber Monday, up 60 percent from Black Friday 2008.

"This is one of the most difficult holiday shopping seasons in decades, and neither consumers nor businesses are immune to this challenging economic environment," said Stephanie Tilenius, General Manager of eBay North America. "But because we are a dynamic marketplace made up of millions of entrepreneurial sellers, many of whom can access - at a discount - the global inventory that piles up during a recession, eBay is able to respond more rapidly to the needs of consumers and deliver some good news for shoppers in the form of great holiday deals."

Healthy Shopping Activity Seen This Cyber Monday

"Cyber Monday continues to be a big day for online shopping,” said Cliff Hopkins, senior director of U.S. marketing for PayPal. "And more shoppers are choosing PayPal because we offer consumers a fast, safe way to pay online. PayPal never shares our customers’ financial information with the merchant, moreover, if you pay with PayPal on eBay you’re covered for the purchase price and original shipping costs on qualified purchases.”

A recent survey of Shopping.com merchants found that nearly a quarter of them experience the highest shopping peak of the season on Cyber Monday. In fact, on the site Cyber Monday traffic was 15 percent higher than Black Friday and conversion to sale was 20 percent higher than 2007.

Busiest Shopping Day Expected on Green Monday

Although eBay, PayPal and Shopping.com saw solid activity on Cyber Monday, the companies once again expect the busiest online shopping day² to come on "Green Monday,” the second Monday in December.

Based on internal eBay Inc. research, the second Monday in December has been the busiest online shopping day since 2001. Historically, PayPal’s Payflow Gateway has 8 percent more transaction volume on Green Monday than Cyber Monday.

In addition, the busiest day in Shopping.com history was December 10, 2007, when the merchant leads increased 54 percent over the previous years.

In Demand Holiday Gifts

Below are some of this season's most popular gifts based on Cyber Monday eBay shopping activity:

Video Game Consoles

Nintendo Wii: 3,017 sold for an average selling price of $349.

Nintendo Wii Fit: 1,305 sold for an average selling price of $143.

Sony Playstation 3: 276 sold for an average selling price of $373.

Consumer Electronics

Garmin Nuvi GPS for an average selling price of $264.

iPod Touch for an average selling price of $298.

iPods/iPod Classic for an average selling price of $238.

iPod Nano for an average selling price of $180.

Smartphones

Apple iPhone 3G for an average selling price of $541.

BlackBerry Storm for an average selling price of $589.

BlackBerry Curve for an average selling price of $274.

T-Mobile Sidekick for an average selling price of $217.

The most searched for product on eBay across all categories this Thanksgiving weekend was the Nintendo Wii; more than 13,000 sold. Following behind this product was the Nintendo Wii Fit and Apple iPhone. On Shopping.com, the Nintendo Wii Fit surfaced as the most searched item; trailing closely behind was the Nintendo Wii and iPod Touch.

About eBay

Founded in 1995, eBay Inc. connects hundreds of millions of people around the world every day, empowering them to explore new opportunities and innovate together. eBay Inc. does this by providing the Internet platforms of choice for global commerce, payments and communications. Since its inception, eBay Inc. has expanded to include some of the strongest brands in the world, including eBay, PayPal, Skype, StubHub, Shopping.com, and others. eBay Inc. is headquartered in San Jose, California.

About PayPal

PayPal is the faster, safer way to pay and get paid online. The service allows users to pay without sharing financial information and gives consumers flexibility to pay, including through account balances, bank accounts or credit cards. With more than 65 million active accounts in 190 markets and 19 currencies around the world, PayPal enables global ecommerce. PayPal is an eBay company. More information about the company can be found at https://www.paypal.com.

About Shopping.com

Shopping.com, an eBay company, pioneered online comparison shopping and today is one of the fastest growing shopping destinations on the Internet with items from thousands of trusted stores from across the Web. With a singular focus on shopping, Shopping.com offers shoppers easy-to-use search tools, engaging content, time-saving navigation, along with millions of product and merchant reviews from the Epinions community, all in one place. The Shopping.com Network powers the shopping experience for hundreds of websites. For more information, please visit www.shopping.com.

¹ May include bundled items.

² Based on sales of fixed-price items.