Carl Icahn Displays Interest In eBay; Shares Surge In After Market Trading

After the market closed on Wednesday, eBay EBAY announced its fourth quarter results that beat on both EPS and revenue. The good news continued as the company announced a $5 billion buyback plan.

eBay also disclosed a non-binding proposal from Carl Icahn who owns a 0.82 percent stake in the company. The activist investor wants the company to spin off PayPal as he believes that PayPal would benefit from a different management team. Icahn has had no talks as of yet with eBay's founder.

Speaking to Bloomberg TV, Icahn said that owning shares of the company is a “no brainer” but the company has not done as well as it should have. Icahn noted that the company's earnings are “lagging” those of other tech companies such as Amazon.com AMZN

Two employees of Carl Icahn were also named to eBay's board of directors.