PayPal, the payments division of the online shopping giant, EBay, will trade on the Nasdaq Stock Market as PYPL, its original ticker symbol before being acquired by the online marketplace in 2002. “I’m honoured and thrilled that PayPal is returning to its roots as an independent company,” said PayPal President, Dan Schulman, who will be the company’s Chief Executive Officer when the split is completed in the third quarter of the year.
He added: “This is a meaningful symbol for the company because it represents our unbroken commitment to the spirit of the original vision that sparked the launch of PayPal seventeen years ago.” EBay announced the split last year after activist investor Carl Icahn said PayPal was being held back by its parent company’s slower-growing Web marketplace business. Schulman joined PayPal, which has 165 million customers in 200 countries, from American Express Co.
