Hot Off the Wire –EBay CEO’s pay slides 55% to $10.1 million; PayPal to double Asian workforce; Google likely to prevail in EU suits

Posted Mar. 21, 2010 at 10:26 p.m.

Hot Off the Wire –EBay CEO’s pay slides 55% to $10.1 million; PayPal to double Asian workforce; Google likely to prevail in EU suits

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A roundup of the latest high-tech news from The Associated Press:

• Compensation for EBay CEO drops 55 percent

SAN FRANCISCO — EBay Chief Executive John Donahoe received compensation valued at $10.1 million in 2009, according to a regulatory filing Friday. That's 55 percent less than in 2008, when he got more stock and options.

Donahoe, 49, has led the online auction site operator since Meg Whitman retired in March 2008. Before that, he was eBay's head of marketplaces. His total compensation in 2008 was $22.5 million.

According to a proxy statement eBay filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission, Donahoe's 2009 pay package included a salary of $934,615, up from $879,808 in 2008; a bonus of $522,917, up from $500,000; and a performance incentive of $1.6 million, up from zero. The 2008 figures include a three-month period when Donahoe wasn't yet CEO.

He received stock and option awards in 2009 valued at $6.9 million when they were granted. In 2008, Donahoe's stock and option awards totaled $20.8 million.

Like many retailers, eBay has been dealing with the slowdown in discretionary consumer spending resulting from the sluggish economy. It ended 2009 on a bright note, though, luring shoppers during the fourth quarter by focusing on deals from sellers who offered free shipping and returns on new items. The company also highlighted ways to save money by promoting products that were new but not the latest model.

Donahoe received other compensation the company valued at $172,394, which included $160,466 worth of personal air travel.

In 2009, eBay earned $2.4 billion, or $1.83 per share, on $8.7 billion in revenue. Over the course of the year, its stock climbed 69 percent, ending at $23.53.

• PayPal plans to double staff in Asia by year's end

SINGAPORE — PayPal, the online payments unit of Internet auction site operator eBay Inc., plans to double its staff in Asia to 2,000 by the end of the year.

"Asia is our fastest growing market and we absolutely expect that trend to continue," President Scott Thompson said last week. "This is going to be a massive market and we look forward to having a really big business here."

PayPal's fourth-quarter revenue outside the U.S. was $364 million, or 46 percent of overall revenue.

Thompson declined to comment on recent Chinese media reports that PayPal is in negotiations for a partnership with e-commerce retailer Alibaba Group, which is 39 percent owned by Yahoo Inc.

PayPal has partnered with China UnionPay — which operates interbank transaction settlement for bankcards in China and the region — and Singapore's DBS bank to provide online payment services to the burgeoning Internet shopping market in Asia.

China UnionPay has issued 2.1 billion bank cards in 10 countries, and its members will be able to use PayPal by the third quarter to make Internet purchases around the world, PayPal said.

Some four million DBS customers will be able to debit their bank accounts to fund PayPal accounts by the middle of the year.

PayPal's Asian operations recently hit a snag in another country, India, where the company has been blocking personal payments as it works out questions posed by Indian regulators. Payments to and from India were first suspended Jan. 28 after regulators began questioning if PayPal payments needed to be regulated like wire transfers of cash.

• Google likely to win EU court battle over ads

LONDON — Google looks likely to win a European high court battle over how it uses keywords in advertising — but legal experts say the issue is likely to keep rattling the search giant.

Rights owners have long complained about Google Inc.'s practice of allowing advertisers to promote their products to customers searching for a rival's goods. Software, airline, luxury goods companies and even a law firm have taken Google to court in a bid to stop the practice, arguing that it hijacks their brand name and misleads consumers.

The case being decided at the European Court of Justice in Luxembourg this week pits Google against a number of French luxury goods firms including LVMH, the firm behind Louis Vuitton handbags.

The companies complain that Google broke the law by accepting ads using brand names without permission, and they fear that counterfeiters and unofficial online stores can buy a keyword such as "Louis Vuitton" and use it to advertise bogus bags.

Even if the LVMH Moet Hennessy lawsuit fails this coming week, the ruling is unlikely to staunch the flow of legal action against Google in the U.S., according to Eric Goldman, who heads the High Tech Law Institute at Santa Clara University of Law.

"Typically the U.S. is rather blase about foreign legal developments," Goldman said. "So no matter what we hear from the European Court of Justice on Tuesday, it won't directly shape legal standards here."

Tags: Hot Off the Wire, Google

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