PayPal Stock Plunges 23% as Breakup Speculation Swirls
The PayPal Mafia got out, but the empire they built is crumbling. The payment empire’s stock has dropped nearly 23% since earnings were released Tuesday, as CEO Alex Chriss was dramatically removed after just two years. With investor patience evaporating, the comeback story feels beside the point — a breakup now seems imminent.
- Apple Pay, browser-stored cards, and buy now, pay later rivals crushed PayPal’s branded checkout growth from 5% to 1% — starving its more profitable business.
- New CEO Enrique Lores has zero payment experience, but plenty of breakup expertise after his HP stint — fueling analyst calls to carve out Venmo and BNPL from the conglomerate.
The autopsy: Former president David Marcus pinned the rot to 2014, when leadership shifted from product-led to finance-led and “short/medium-term predictability beat long-term vision.” PayPal chased a “super app” dream through scattered acquisitions like Honey, while rivals built standalone brands off the BNPL shift. Then Visa dealt the death blow, blocking PayPal from steering users to cheaper bank payments that had protected its margins. Now investors face a grim choice — bet that a hardware veteran can pull off a real turnaround, or sit back and watch him dismantle the firm.
