Mitrade Insights is dedicated to providing investors with rich, timely and most valuable financial information to help investors grasp the market situation and find timely trading opportunities.

2021

Best News & Analysis Provider

FxDailyInfo

2022

Best Forex Educational Resources Global

International Business Magazine

Insights

News

PayPal Is Down More Than 80% From Its Peak. Here's Why I Still Own It

Source The Motley Fool

Key Points

PayPal shares are about 80% below their 2021 high.
The company trades for about 10 times forward earnings.
PayPal has bought back shares aggressively in recent years.
10 stocks we like better than PayPal ›

PayPal (NASDAQ:PYPL) was one of the biggest winners in the COVID-19 era, with soaring e-commerce demand sending its stock to a peak of about $310 per share in mid-2021. Today, it trades for more than 80% below that peak, and reports of takeover talks are now dead.

I bought shares of PayPal far more recently than the pandemic-era peak, but shares are still significantly below my average cost basis. But I'm holding on to my shares, and believe PayPal represents one of the best risk-reward plays in all of value investing right now.

Missed Nvidia in 2009? This Rare Signal Is Flashing Again. In 2009, a "Double Down" signal flashed for a little-known chipmaker called Nvidia. For the first time in years, that same "Total Conviction" signal is flashing for a company 1/100th the size of Nvidia. Continue »

Person smiling while paying with PayPal.

Image source: PayPal.

PayPal: Then and now

In a nutshell, PayPal's growth slowed dramatically as the pandemic began to wane. Not only were general e-commerce tailwinds dissipating, but the branded checkout business faced stiff competition from Apple Pay, Shop Pay, and others. Investors were simply not willing to pay high multiples for single-digit growth.

Here's where PayPal stands today. The company's active user base has been relatively flat for some time, but in the most recent quarter, PayPal's revenue grew 5%, and total payment volume increased 10% year-over-year. It's a modest level of growth, but it's still a growing business. Plus, PayPal owns Venmo, and management has been focusing on making the leading peer-to-peer payments app more profitable.

Speaking of profitability, PayPal's growth may be sluggish, but this is a wildly profitable company. It generated $1.8 billion in free cash flow in the most recent quarter, and management has been aggressively buying back shares.

Why am I still holding PayPal?

The short answer is that the risk-reward dynamics make a lot of sense. At the current price, PayPal trades for about 10 times forward earnings, and at that price, PayPal doesn't need rapid growth to be a good investment. Even a combination of modest profit growth and a rapidly shrinking share count should keep EPS rising at a healthy pace. For example, if PayPal grows its income by about 4% per year and lowers its share count through buybacks by about 8% annually, we'd see double-digit EPS growth.

Of course, there are some big risk factors. For example, if PayPal's branded checkout business continues to lose ground, it could make me reconsider. But the bottom line is that although PayPal isn't the growth stock it was in 2021, with an aggressive buyback and excellent free cash flow, it's a company worth owning.

Should you buy stock in PayPal right now?

Before you buy stock in PayPal, consider this:

The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the 10 best stocks for investors to buy now… and PayPal wasn’t one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years.

Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $350,756!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you’d have $1,363,905!*

Now, it’s worth noting Stock Advisor’s total average return is 922% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 213% for the S&P 500. Don't miss the latest top 10 list, available with Stock Advisor, and join an investing community built by individual investors for individual investors.

See the 10 stocks »

*Stock Advisor returns as of October 23, 2026.

Matt Frankel, CFP® has positions in PayPal and has the following options: long January 2027 $75 calls on PayPal, long January 2027 $95 calls on PayPal, short January 2027 $135 calls on PayPal, and short January 2027 $85 calls on PayPal. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends PayPal. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: short December 2026 $62.50 calls on PayPal. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Disclaimer: For information purposes only. Past performance is not indicative of future results.

Recommended Articles

Dollar presses 102 as the 10-year yield sits at 5.14% — and October hike odds are only 17%The dollar index closed at 101.99 (+0.20%) on Monday after briefly topping 102.07, while the 10-year Treasury yield rose to 5.14% and the 2-year hit 4.774% — yet futures price only about a 17% chance of a hike at the October 27-28 FOMC, versus roughly 90% for December. The driver is a global bond selloff, not a Fed repricing: France's 10-year OAT jumped to 4.84% ~ 4.94% and the OAT-Bund spread widened to 140 ~ 146bp. Here are the levels, the cross-asset read-through and what to watch.

Author Irene Q.

Oct 20, Tue

The dollar index closed at 101.99 (+0.20%) on Monday after briefly topping 102.07, while the 10-year Treasury yield rose to 5.14% and the 2-year hit 4.774% — yet futures price only about a 17% chance of a hike at the October 27-28 FOMC, versus roughly 90% for December. The driver is a global bond selloff, not a Fed repricing: France's 10-year OAT jumped to 4.84% ~ 4.94% and the OAT-Bund spread widened to 140 ~ 146bp. Here are the levels, the cross-asset read-through and what to watch.

Meta's AI bill just hit $145 billion — and it issued a new share class to pay for it Meta reported record third-quarter revenue of $64.60 billion, up 26% from a year earlier, and raised full-year 2026 capital expenditure guidance to $135-145 billion from $130-145 billion. To fund that build-out without touching Mark Zuckerberg's voting control, the company announced a 2-for-1 stock split that hands every Class A holder a new non-voting Class C share. Here are the four lines that matter, the peer group that is being re-rated alongside it, and the bull and bear cases.

Author Irene Q.

Oct 22, Thu

Meta reported record third-quarter revenue of $64.60 billion, up 26% from a year earlier, and raised full-year 2026 capital expenditure guidance to $135-145 billion from $130-145 billion. To fund that build-out without touching Mark Zuckerberg's voting control, the company announced a 2-for-1 stock split that hands every Class A holder a new non-voting Class C share. Here are the four lines that matter, the peer group that is being re-rated alongside it, and the bull and bear cases.

The Fed will sit still on October 28 — but 100 of 100 economists now expect a December hike A Reuters poll run October 16-20 found 94 of 100 economists expecting the Fed to hold at 3.75-4.00% on October 28 — and all 100 expecting a hike in December, against less than half a month earlier. The market is close to the same price, with CME FedWatch at roughly 17% for October and 82.8% for December. With the Fed in blackout since October 17, here are the five dates that decide the rest of the year, what each one is priced for, and the two directions each can take.

Author Irene Q.

Oct 22, Thu

A Reuters poll run October 16-20 found 94 of 100 economists expecting the Fed to hold at 3.75-4.00% on October 28 — and all 100 expecting a hike in December, against less than half a month earlier. The market is close to the same price, with CME FedWatch at roughly 17% for October and 82.8% for December. With the Fed in blackout since October 17, here are the five dates that decide the rest of the year, what each one is priced for, and the two directions each can take.

Gold Price Analysis Today | Forex Gold Analysis | XAU/USD Analysis - October 23, 2026 Get the latest gold price analysis, forex gold insights, and XAU/USD analysis for October 23, 2026. Read on for the details.

Author Mitrade

Yesterday 02: 56

Get the latest gold price analysis, forex gold insights, and XAU/USD analysis for October 23, 2026. Read on for the details.

Nasdaq closes at 26,008.86 — 8.9 points above 26,000, and the credit market never blinked The Nasdaq Composite fell 2.60% to 26,008.86 on October 22, its worst session since June, as Meta sank 6.98% on 2026 capex guidance of $135–145 billion. But the equal-weight S&P 500 rose 0.73%, high-yield credit was flat and 10-year yields fell 20 basis points. This was an AI de-rating, not a risk-off event — here is the transmission chain, the 29,000 / 28,200 levels and what would prove it wrong.

Author Irene Q.

21 hours ago

The Nasdaq Composite fell 2.60% to 26,008.86 on October 22, its worst session since June, as Meta sank 6.98% on 2026 capex guidance of $135–145 billion. But the equal-weight S&P 500 rose 0.73%, high-yield credit was flat and 10-year yields fell 20 basis points. This was an AI de-rating, not a risk-off event — here is the transmission chain, the 29,000 / 28,200 levels and what would prove it wrong.

Popular Symbols