PayPal (PYPL +1.34%), one of the world’s leading digital payment companies, saw its stock decline about 40% over the past three years. It lost its luster as its growth in accounts and sales stalled out, but its stock also looks historically cheap at nine times this year’s earnings. Will it stabilize its business, keep growing, and reward its patient investors over the next three years?
Image source: PayPal.
What happened to PayPal over the past few years?
PayPal suffered a major setback in 2018, when its former parent company eBay announced it would switch to Adyen as its preferred payment provider. That decoupling, which lasted through 2023, throttled PayPal’s revenue growth.
PayPal’s growth during the pandemic cushioned that blow, but it struggled to sustain that momentum after those temporary tailwinds dissipated. It also faced tougher competition from other digital payment platforms. It relied more heavily on its unbranded payment processing platform, Braintree, and its peer-to-peer payments platform, Venmo, to offset that pressure.
Today’s Change
(1.34%) $0.60
Current Price
$45.27
Key Data Points
Market Cap
$41B
Day’s Range
$44.28 – $45.47
52wk Range
$38.46 – $79.50
Volume
336K
Avg Vol
24M
Gross Margin
41.78%
Dividend Yield
0.63%
However, Braintree and Venmo both generated lower margins and take rates (the percentage of revenue it retains from each transaction) than PayPal’s core platform of branded checkout services. As a result, its transaction take rate dropped from 2.89% in 2015 to 1.66% in 2025.
From 2022 to 2025, its active accounts only grew from 435 million to 439 million. However, its revenue grew at a 6% CAGR as it rolled out more features to boost total transactions per user, and its EPS grew at a 37% CAGR as it cut costs and repurchased more shares.
What will happen to PayPal over the next three years?
From 2025 to 2028, analysts expect PayPal’s revenue and EPS to grow at CAGRs of 4% and 6%, respectively. That steady growth should be fueled by its deeper partnerships with credit card companies, new products and services for brick-and-mortar stores, the expansion of Venmo into more stores and services, and the expansion of its ecosystem with more crypto trading tools, high-yield savings accounts, and stablecoin-driven cross-border transfers. It’s also bundling together its payment, financial services, and risk management tools into the unified PayPal Open platform to increase the stickiness of that expanding ecosystem.
PayPal’s high-growth days are over, but it could generate steady gains over the next three years. Assuming it matches analysts’ earnings estimates through 2028, grows its EPS by another 6% in 2029, and trades at a more generous 15 times earnings by the beginning of that final year, its stock could more than double to over $100 within the next three years. However, I wouldn’t touch it as a turnaround play yet until I see its take rates and margins stabilize.
Leo Sun has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Adyen, PayPal, and eBay. The Motley Fool recommends the following options: long January 2027 $42.50 calls on PayPal and short March 2026 $65 calls on PayPal. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.