Ebay unveils higher profits

Online auction site Ebay, one of the few successes of the dotcom era, has posted improved profits and said it continued to see strong consumer spending on new and used goods from antiques to cars.

The company, which earlier this year completed a £1bn takeover of online payment service PayPal, said pre-tax profits rose to £39.3m, up from £12.1m the previous year.

Revenues rose to £186m, up from £125.3m a year earlier.

"We had a very strong back-to-school shopping season and continue to see strong growth across Ebay," said the chief financial officer, Rajiv Dutta.

"We are quite confident on the fourth quarter and 2004."

Ebay was one of the few true successes of the dotcom era, taking a cut each time someone bought or sold something on the site.

It now has millions of users around the world, buying and selling everything from mechanical diggers to sold out concert tickets, and has seen off most of its competitors.

However, some analysts remain worried Ebay won't be able to continue its rapid rate of growth as the number of users hits saturation point.

Mr Dutta said Ebay's recent rapid expansion was "absolutely continuing", pointing to the fact that one of the fastest growing categories on the auction site was the "everything else" section, suggesting there was still room to build new merchandising categories.