Record revenue, raised guidance, and a workforce reduction land together as Wall Street rewards the networking firm’s repositioning around AI infrastructure

Cisco Systems delivered one of the more striking earnings reports of the season on Wednesday, posting record quarterly revenue, raising its full-year guidance, and simultaneously announcing the elimination of fewer than 4,000 jobs. The combination produced a sharp rally in the stock, with shares climbing as much as 20% in after-hours trading and helping lift the Dow Jones Industrial Average back above 50,000 the following session.

The reaction crystallized a pattern that has defined enterprise technology earnings over the past year: investors are rewarding companies that pair clear AI revenue traction with disciplined cost moves, even when those moves come at the expense of headcount.

The Numbers

For the fiscal third quarter ended April 25, 2026, Cisco reported revenue of $15.84 billion, up 12% from $14.15 billion a year earlier and above the $15.56 billion analysts polled by LSEG had expected. Adjusted earnings per share came in at $1.06, ahead of the $1.04 consensus estimate. GAAP net income reached $3.4 billion, a 35% increase year-over-year.

The order book was stronger still. Total product orders rose 35% year-over-year. Networking product orders climbed more than 50%, and data-center switching orders rose more than 40%, reflecting accelerating demand for the infrastructure that underpins AI training and inference workloads.

The headline figure that drew the most attention from analysts was the company’s AI infrastructure pipeline. Cisco said it has secured $5.3 billion in AI infrastructure orders from hyperscale customers so far this fiscal year, and raised its full-year order target to $9 billion, up from a prior projection of $5 billion. Its forecast for AI-related revenue in fiscal 2026 was lifted to $4 billion, up from $3 billion.

Looking ahead, Cisco guided to fourth-quarter revenue of $16.7 billion to $16.9 billion and adjusted earnings of $1.16 to $1.18 per share, both well ahead of analyst consensus. Full-year revenue guidance was raised to a range of $62.8 billion to $63 billion. The company said both ranges account for the estimated impact of tariffs under current trade policy.

The Layoffs Investors Cheered

Hours after the earnings release, Cisco confirmed it would reduce its workforce in the current quarter by fewer than 4,000 employees, representing less than 5% of its roughly 86,000-person global workforce. The company expects to incur up to $1 billion in restructuring costs, with about $450 million recognized in the fiscal fourth quarter.

In the company’s framing, the cuts are about reallocation rather than retrenchment. CEO Chuck Robbins said Cisco is positioning itself as critical infrastructure for the AI era, and the company described the reductions as part of a shift toward AI, security, silicon, and optics. Cisco said affected employees would be offered pro-rated fiscal 2026 bonuses, internal and external placement services, and one year of access to its Cisco U courses and certifications covering AI, security, and networking.

What is striking is the market’s response to a firm cutting jobs at the same moment it reported record revenue and raised guidance. Several analysts characterized the layoffs as a reallocation of resources rather than a response to weak demand, noting that the up to $1 billion in restructuring charges suggested Cisco was repositioning around higher-growth businesses. That interpretation drove the share rally, with reports describing the move as on track for the stock’s sharpest single-session gain since 2002.

What It Says About The Cycle

Cisco’s report joins a clear trend across enterprise technology. Companies including Meta, Google, Microsoft, and Salesforce have all announced versions of the same playbook over the past 18 months: strong financial results paired with workforce reductions framed as a pivot toward AI. In a number of these cases, the strong results have been described by management as the reason the cuts could happen — capital is being redirected toward higher-growth product areas rather than preserved in legacy organizational structures.

For investors tracking AI capital expenditure cycles, the Cisco update sharpens the picture in two ways. First, it confirms that demand from hyperscale customers for AI-related networking and switching gear continues to accelerate, with order growth running well ahead of revenue recognition. Second, it shows that legacy networking incumbents can credibly position themselves inside the AI infrastructure buildout, not only as suppliers of chips but as suppliers of the systems that connect them.

The broader market took the cue. The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed about 0.75% the following session to retake 50,000, while the S&P 500 and Nasdaq Composite each set fresh records, closing at 7,501.24 and 26,635.22 respectively. AI-related names continued to lead the rally, even as cyclical sectors lagged.

The questions for the quarters ahead are whether Cisco can convert its raised order pipeline into recognized revenue without margin compression, whether tariffs reshape the demand picture, and whether the AI-driven order strength now visible at hyperscalers extends to enterprise customers. The next test will come with fourth-quarter results and the company’s initial fiscal 2027 outlook.

For now, the market has registered its verdict. A record-revenue quarter paired with significant job cuts produced a rally rather than a sell-off, an outcome that says as much about how investors are interpreting the AI cycle as it does about Cisco itself.

The world’s largest oil exporter just put a hard timeline on the global energy disruption. Saudi Aramco CEO Amin Nasser said on May 11, 2026 that the global oil market will lose around 100 million barrels per week if the Strait of Hormuz remains disrupted at current rates, and that the market will not normalize until 2027 if the chokepoint stays closed beyond mid-June. The warning, delivered as the 2026 Iran war enters its third month, reshapes the planning horizon for energy markets, central banks, and multinationals.

For investors who entered 2026 expecting falling oil prices and a Federal Reserve rate-cutting cycle, the Aramco assessment confirms that both scenarios are now off the table for the foreseeable future.

The 100 Million Barrel Math

The Strait of Hormuz is the most consequential chokepoint in the global oil trade. Roughly 20% of the world’s oil transits the narrow waterway in peacetime, alongside major volumes of liquefied natural gas. Disruption at that scale has no clean substitute on the global supply map.

Nasser’s 100 million barrel weekly figure puts numbers to what tanker tracking and shipping insurance markets have been signaling for weeks. Iranian restrictions on vessel movements, combined with insurance market pullbacks and rerouting of tankers, have throttled outflows from major Persian Gulf producers including Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait, Iraq, and Qatar.

The Aramco CEO went further on refined products. Nasser warned that global gasoline and jet fuel supplies could reach critically low levels by summer 2026 if shipping lanes do not reopen. That assessment lands during peak Northern Hemisphere driving and travel demand, a period when refined product inventories typically draw down even under normal conditions.

A 2027 Normalization Timeline

The 2027 recovery timeline is the most consequential element of Nasser’s warning for long-term capital allocation. By tying normalization to the mid-June 2026 reopening threshold, the Aramco CEO effectively signaled that the producer community sees a closing window for avoiding multi-year structural damage to the global oil trade.

The reasoning is operational. Refineries that have idled or reduced runs require time and capital to restart. Tanker schedules, port logistics, and insurance frameworks need to rebuild. Strategic petroleum reserves drawn down during the conflict need replenishment, which itself adds demand pressure. Each additional week of disruption compounds the recovery curve.

For Gulf producers, the math is also commercial. Lost barrels are not always recoverable in later periods, particularly as buyers shift toward longer-term supply arrangements with producers outside the Persian Gulf, including the United States, Brazil, and West Africa.

Where Crude Sits Today

Markets have already priced in significant supply disruption, but Nasser’s framing suggests current levels may understate the longer-term risk. West Texas Intermediate crude futures settled at $102.18 per barrel on May 12, 2026, up 4.19% on the session. Brent has stabilized around $100 per barrel after the violent confrontations in the Persian Gulf earlier in May.

The supply buffers that have insulated markets so far are thinning. JPMorgan economists told clients in a Thursday note that the cushion is eroding. “We expect to see increasing signs of demand destruction as energy product consumers adjust to rising prices,” the bank’s economists wrote. That demand destruction is itself an economic cost — one that surfaces in slower industrial output, weaker consumer spending, and rising input costs for energy-intensive manufacturers.

In the United States, the Trump administration released a record 8.6 million barrels of oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserve last week to soften domestic prices. The release is the largest single-week draw in the SPR’s history, and energy analysts have noted that further heavy releases will leave the reserve depleted at a moment when global supply remains constrained.

The Spillover Into Rates and Inflation

The energy disruption is no longer a commodity story alone. Bond markets have repriced the U.S. interest rate path in line with the inflationary impact of higher oil prices. 10-year Treasury yields have risen approximately 40 basis points since the start of the conflict, according to Wolfe Research analysis. The Bureau of Labor Statistics reported on May 12 that April CPI rose 3.8% year-over-year, the highest reading since May 2023, with energy accounting for over 40% of the monthly gain.

Traders have raised the odds of a Federal Reserve rate hike by year-end to roughly 30%, according to CME Group FedWatch data, reversing earlier 2026 expectations of cuts. Bank of America has pushed its forecast for the first rate cut into the second half of 2027 — a timeline that now mirrors Aramco’s projected oil market normalization horizon.

The convergence is not coincidental. Central banks across developed markets are facing a common problem: an energy-driven inflation shock that complicates the policy easing cycle most economies need to support growth.

What It Means for Businesses and Markets

For multinational corporates, the Aramco warning reframes 2026 and 2027 planning assumptions. Airlines, shipping operators, petrochemical manufacturers, and logistics providers are now confronting the possibility that elevated energy costs extend into 2027. Earnings forecasts built around lower fuel inputs require revision.

For emerging market economies that import the bulk of their energy, the picture is harder still. Higher dollar-denominated oil costs combined with strong dollar dynamics create compound pressure on currencies, fiscal balances, and consumer purchasing power. Sovereign issuers in Asia, Africa, and Latin America with significant energy import bills face widening current account deficits.

For equity markets, the implications cut both ways. Energy producers and integrated majors benefit from sustained high prices, while consumer discretionary, industrial, and transportation sectors face margin compression. The defensive rotation visible in Tuesday’s U.S. trading session — with health care, staples, and financials outperforming tech — reflects the early stages of that repositioning.

The mid-June 2026 timeline is now the most important date on the global energy calendar. President Trump’s state visit to Beijing on May 13-15 includes direct discussions with President Xi Jinping on the Strait of Hormuz, and China holds significant leverage over Tehran as the largest buyer of Iranian oil. Any diplomatic movement during or after the summit could begin to price normalization scenarios back into futures curves.

If the disruption extends past mid-June, the Aramco CEO’s 2027 recovery framework will likely shape supply contracts, hedging strategies, and central bank policy posture for the remainder of the year. For now, the warning from the world’s largest oil exporter is the clearest signal yet that this is not a short-term shock.

Shares of Moderna surged 7.5% on Monday after the biotech company disclosed that it had been developing a hantavirus vaccine ahead of the outbreak aboard the MV Hondius cruise ship. The single-day move stood out against an otherwise quiet trading session and gave investors fresh evidence that Moderna’s pipeline extends beyond the COVID-19 franchise that has defined its public profile for the past five years.

The move came as two American patients exposed to hantavirus aboard the MV Hondius were transferred Monday to Emory University Hospital in Atlanta for treatment at the hospital’s Serious Communicable Diseases Unit. Sixteen additional Americans from the same vessel were evacuated to the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha, the country’s only national quarantine unit.

For Moderna, the disclosure landed at a particularly useful moment. Biotech stocks have come under sustained pressure in recent quarters, weighed down by GLP-1 competition, broader healthcare cost concerns, and questions about post-pandemic vaccine demand. Monday’s rally suggests investors are reassessing the company’s broader infectious disease pipeline, even if the immediate commercial implications of hantavirus work remain narrow.

Why Hantavirus Matters Now

Hantavirus is a category of rare viruses that, in most cases, spread to humans through inhalation of contaminated rodent droppings. The Andes strain implicated in the MV Hondius outbreak is unusual because it can spread between people in limited circumstances, a feature that has driven heightened attention to the cluster.

The World Health Organization has confirmed eight cases linked to the ship and has emphasized that the global public health risk remains low. WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said over the weekend that based on the available scientific assessment, the public should not panic.

Three people have died in the outbreak so far, including a married couple and a German national. The ship, with 27 crew members still aboard, is sailing toward Rotterdam in the Netherlands and is scheduled to arrive May 17.

Hantavirus vaccine development is a relatively narrow biotech segment. There is no commercially available hantavirus vaccine globally, and the disease’s relatively low incidence in most years has limited commercial investment. The MV Hondius outbreak has changed that math, at least in the short term, by elevating the profile of a long-overlooked pathogen.

The Market Response

Moderna’s 7.5% Monday move was the biggest single-day percentage gain in the stock over the past several weeks. Pfizer shares also moved higher, reflecting the broader vaccine sector momentum as investors revisited which companies have pipeline exposure to emerging infectious disease threats.

The move stands in contrast to recent biotech sector weakness. The iShares Biotechnology ETF has lagged the broader market in 2026 amid pressure from GLP-1 weight loss drug competition, FDA reimbursement debates, and broader healthcare cost scrutiny. Vaccine-focused names in particular have struggled to find a clear post-pandemic earnings narrative.

For Moderna specifically, the company has spent the past two years building out a non-COVID pipeline that includes respiratory syncytial virus, influenza, latent viruses, rare diseases, and several oncology candidates. Hantavirus work fits into the broader infectious disease platform.

A Reminder of Pipeline Optionality

The Monday rally is a reminder that biotech investors continue to pay for pipeline optionality, particularly in moments when a real-world public health event surfaces a candidate that had previously been below the radar. The pattern is familiar. During the early phases of COVID-19, vaccine developers including Moderna, BioNTech, Novavax, and Inovio saw outsized stock moves as investors repriced their pipelines against the unfolding crisis. The same dynamic, on a much smaller scale, appears to be playing out around hantavirus this week.

That said, investors should be cautious about extrapolating. Hantavirus is not a pandemic-scale pathogen, and the commercial market for a hantavirus vaccine is likely to be modest, anchored by government stockpiling contracts, military and biodefense procurement, and limited regional demand in areas where the disease is endemic. Any near-term revenue impact for Moderna is likely to be small relative to the company’s overall income statement.

What to Watch Next

Several factors will determine whether Monday’s rally has staying power.

Federal procurement decisions could be the key catalyst. The US Department of Health and Human Services and the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority have historically funded development of vaccines against pathogens with biodefense or pandemic-preparedness implications. If the MV Hondius outbreak prompts new procurement contracts, Moderna and any other companies with hantavirus candidates could benefit.

Phase data and regulatory updates will be the second variable. Moderna has not publicly disclosed full details on the stage of its hantavirus candidate, and additional information from company filings or scientific presentations could shift the stock further in either direction.

Broader biotech sentiment matters as well. Monday’s move occurred in a session where the S&P 500 and Nasdaq closed at record highs, supported by AI-driven tech earnings. Whether biotech can sustain a rotation higher in the current macro environment, with elevated oil prices and a leadership transition underway at the Federal Reserve, will shape sector positioning in the weeks ahead.

For investors, Moderna’s Monday gain is more than a one-session move. It is a reminder that pipeline depth matters even in a sector where commercial narratives can sour quickly, and that emerging infectious disease events can rapidly reshape how the market values biotech assets that previously sat outside the spotlight. Whether the rally proves durable will depend on what comes next from regulators, federal procurement agencies, and Moderna’s own pipeline disclosures in the weeks ahead.=

Rackspace Technology and Advanced Micro Devices have signed a memorandum of understanding to build a new category of governed Enterprise AI Cloud aimed at regulated industries and sovereign workloads, sending Rackspace shares sharply higher and reinforcing one of the most distinctive trends in the current AI infrastructure cycle: the pivot from generic GPU rental toward fully managed, compliance-grade AI environments.

The deal, announced May 7, 2026, sent Rackspace Technology shares up 12.5%, while AMD shares rose 1.7% on the day. AMD’s gain came on top of better-than-expected first-quarter earnings reported earlier in the week, adding to the momentum behind the chipmaker’s expanding role in enterprise AI deployments.

What the Deal Does

According to Rackspace’s investor announcement and the joint press release issued through GlobeNewswire, the MOU establishes a framework for a multiyear strategic partnership to create an Enterprise AI Cloud purpose-built for regulated enterprises and sovereign workloads “where security, governance, and accountability are non-negotiable.”

The collaboration is structured around the integration of AMD Instinct GPUs and EPYC CPUs into a fully managed, governed stack. Under the proposed model, Rackspace would own the entire stack from silicon to applications, providing one operator accountable for every layer of the AI infrastructure, calibrated to the sovereignty, performance, and compliance requirements of each workload.

The companies have outlined four integrated capabilities that the partnership aims to deliver: dedicated bare-metal AMD Instinct compute for customers requiring physical isolation; an Enterprise Inference Engine; Inference-as-a-Service backed by managed AMD Instinct GPUs; and a fully managed, private and hybrid Enterprise AI Cloud combining AMD compute with Rackspace’s managed operating model.

It is important to note that the agreement is a non-binding memorandum, not a definitive contract. According to Rackspace’s regulatory filings, the MOU is “a framework for potential collaboration and does not constitute a binding commitment by either party to complete any specific transaction.” Commercial terms, financing arrangements, and timeline have not been finalized.

Why It Matters

The Rackspace-AMD partnership represents a structural shift in the enterprise AI infrastructure market. The dominant model for AI compute over the past three years has been hourly GPU rental, with hyperscale providers offering raw compute capacity to anyone willing to pay. Regulated industries, including financial services, healthcare, defense, and government, have struggled to fit into that model because they need verifiable governance, deterministic performance, and clear lines of accountability for outcomes.

“The market is moving in the direction we anticipated, with regulated enterprises making deliberate choices about where their AI runs, who operates it, and who is accountable for outcomes,” Rackspace CEO Gajen Kandiah said in remarks accompanying the announcement.

In a separate quote in the joint press release, AMD framed the partnership in similar terms: “Our collaboration with Rackspace delivers AMD AI compute into managed, private and governed environments so enterprises can deploy AI with the performance and flexibility their workloads demand.”

The strategic logic for AMD is clear. The company has spent the past two years working to break NVIDIA’s near-monopoly on AI training and inference workloads. Partnering with a managed-services player that owns customer relationships in regulated industries provides AMD with a distribution channel that bypasses the standard hyperscaler-dominated path to enterprise AI deployment.

For Rackspace, the deal is positioned as a way to differentiate from raw cloud capacity providers by combining infrastructure ownership with operational accountability. By controlling the full stack and providing defined SLAs, Rackspace is targeting a customer base willing to pay a premium for governed, auditable AI deployments.

The Big Picture: $700 Billion and Climbing

The deal lands as global AI infrastructure spending continues its historic acceleration. Big Tech is on pace to spend approximately $700 billion on AI infrastructure in 2026, with McKinsey projecting that global AI capex demand could reach $6.7 trillion by 2030.

That investment cycle has so far been concentrated in hyperscale data centers and frontier model training clusters. The Rackspace-AMD deal points to a parallel buildout that is increasingly important: the layer of governed, compliance-aware infrastructure needed to bring AI into regulated production environments.

Sovereign AI infrastructure has become a geopolitical and commercial priority for national governments and large enterprises alike. National governments in Europe, the Middle East, and Asia have signaled growing demand for AI compute that operates under domestic legal jurisdiction with clear data residency and operational accountability. Regulated U.S. industries, particularly financial services and healthcare, are facing similar pressures from both regulators and internal risk teams.

Stock Reaction and Earnings Backdrop

Rackspace’s 12.5% surge reflected investor enthusiasm for the strategic pivot, layered on top of the company’s first-quarter earnings, which Kandiah said reflected a strategy that is delivering. AMD’s 1.7% gain followed its earlier-in-the-week earnings beat, where the company exceeded Wall Street’s first-quarter expectations on both revenue and EPS.

The broader semiconductor and AI infrastructure complex has been a significant driver of equity index gains in 2026, with year-over-year EPS growth in the technology sector projected at 18-22% for the year. Rackspace, by contrast, had spent much of the past five years rebuilding its position after multiple strategic shifts, and the AMD MOU represents the company’s most significant catalyst for re-rating since its 2020 IPO.

Risks Investors Should Note

Several caveats apply. The MOU is non-binding, and no definitive agreements have been reached. Rackspace’s filings explicitly note that “discussions remain preliminary, and there can be no assurance that any such arrangements will be entered into or that the parties will reach definitive agreement on terms.” Any third-party financing required to implement the partnership remains subject to availability of financing on acceptable terms.

For investors, the question is whether Rackspace can convert the strategic positioning into durable revenue, and whether AMD can leverage the partnership to materially expand its enterprise AI footprint against NVIDIA’s dominant share. If both happen, the AMD-Rackspace MOU may mark the beginning of a new chapter in how regulated industries deploy AI.

Disclaimer: This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute financial or investment advice. Stock prices and corporate developments are subject to change. The MOU described in this article is non-binding and may not result in a definitive agreement. Readers should conduct their own research and consult a qualified financial advisor before making investment decisions.

Ryan Cohen just handed Wall Street the most audacious corporate proposal of 2026.

GameStop, the video game retailer that became a cultural flashpoint during the meme stock frenzy of 2021, has submitted an unsolicited, non-binding proposal to acquire eBay for $125 per share in a cash-and-stock deal valued at approximately $55.5 billion. The offer, announced Sunday evening, sent eBay shares surging nearly 12% in after-hours trading and touched off a firestorm of reactions across trading floors and financial news desks from Wall Street to Silicon Valley.

The move represents a tectonic shift in ambition for a company that, not long ago, was written off as a relic of brick-and-mortar retail clinging to relevance in a digital-first world.

The Offer on the Table

The offer is structured as half cash and half GameStop stock, representing a 46% premium to eBay’s closing share price on February 4 — the day GameStop began quietly building a 5% stake in the company. It also represents a 20% premium to eBay’s Friday close of $104.07.

Financing for the transaction would come from two sources: a roughly $9.4 billion cash reserve GameStop held as of January 31, 2026, and up to $20 billion in debt backed by a commitment letter already secured from TD Securities. Cohen told CNBC that GameStop also has the ability to issue additional stock to bridge any remaining gap.

EBay confirmed it received the offer in a statement Monday and said its board would review it. Markets, however, remained skeptical. Shares of eBay climbed about 6% after the Monday open to just over $110 — well below the $125 offer price — suggesting investors doubt the deal will close.

Cohen’s Vision: A Rival to Amazon

The logic behind the deal, as Cohen frames it, is sweeping. Cohen told the Wall Street Journal that the platform “could be a legit competitor” to Amazon, arguing that eBay has underperformed relative to its spending, pointing to minimal user growth despite roughly $2.4 billion in annual marketing costs.

Cohen pledged to find some $2 billion in annual savings within 12 months of a deal closing. Sales and marketing, product development, and general and administrative line items are all in scope for cuts. GameStop calculated that expense reductions of that magnitude would push eBay’s diluted earnings per share from $4.26 to $7.79.

Cohen’s vision extends beyond cost reduction. GameStop’s roughly 1,600 domestic stores were cited in the proposal as a ready-made infrastructure asset that eBay could leverage for item authentication, seller intake, order fulfillment, and live commerce. The idea is to turn physical retail locations — long seen as a liability in an age of digital downloads — into a supply chain advantage for a scaled e-commerce platform.

Cohen told the Journal he is thinking about turning eBay into something worth hundreds of billions of dollars. In January, GameStop unveiled a compensation package that would reward Cohen with options on over 171 million shares if he lifted GameStop’s market value to $100 billion. Under the proposed deal structure, Cohen intends to lead the merged entity as chief executive, forgoing any salary or cash bonuses in favor of compensation tied entirely to the performance of the combined company.

From Meme Stock to M&A Heavyweight

The bid caps a transformation that few observers predicted. Since taking the reins at GameStop in early 2021, Cohen oversaw a financial turnaround that erased a $381 million net loss recorded that year and produced $418 million in net income by fiscal 2025, with SG&A costs cut by roughly $800 million along the way.

Cohen’s entrepreneurial track record includes co-founding Chewy, the e-commerce pet products company that PetSmart acquired for $3.35 billion in 2017. He has long argued that his experience building a direct-to-consumer e-commerce operation from the ground up gives him an edge that institutional management teams lack.

Cohen himself owns about 9% of GameStop and takes no salary or cash bonuses under his employment agreement, along with no golden parachute. That structure, he argues, aligns his incentives entirely with shareholders — a contrast he has drawn repeatedly with what he described as “perverse financial incentives” embedded in eBay’s current board and management team.

Wall Street Pushes Back

Not everyone on Wall Street is convinced. Bernstein analysts wrote in a note to clients that while there is overlap between GameStop’s and eBay’s businesses in games, toys and collectibles, the strategic rationale for such a deal remains unclear. They added that eBay’s current management team’s tenure has had its “ups and downs,” but that “recent execution has been solid,” asking: “Why disrupt things? The turnaround is working.”

The financing structure has also drawn scrutiny. GameStop’s current market value sits just below $12 billion, while eBay’s stands at $46 billion — making this a smaller company reaching far above its weight class, with a substantial funding gap remaining even after the TD Bank commitment is accounted for. Cohen offered limited clarity during a Monday morning appearance on CNBC’s Squawk Box, at times directing viewers to GameStop’s website for deal specifics.

Cohen confirmed he has not yet held any conversations with eBay’s management team, saying: “We are just starting. For obvious reasons, eBay is a public company, there’s all kinds of perverse financial incentives from the board to the management team. So there’s only one way to approach something like this.”

A Proxy Fight on the Horizon

If eBay’s board declines to engage, Cohen has made clear he will not walk away quietly. Cohen told the Wall Street Journal he is prepared to pursue a proxy fight and take the offer directly to eBay shareholders if the board declines to engage. That threat alone gives the bid teeth, regardless of how the board initially responds.

The financing structure behind the deal raises questions that neither side has fully answered yet, and the effective premium continues to shrink as eBay’s stock price moves closer to the $125 offer level.

What is certain is that Ryan Cohen — who once openly told investors that his next big move would be “either genius or totally, totally foolish” — has placed his most consequential bet. Wall Street, as of Monday, remains undecided on which it is.

Disclaimer: This article is intended for informational and news reporting purposes only and does not constitute financial advice, investment recommendations, or an offer to buy or sell any securities. The information presented is based on publicly available reporting and announcements as of May 4, 2026. Stock prices, deal terms, and corporate positions may change. Readers should conduct their own due diligence and consult a licensed financial advisor before making any investment decisions. NYWire does not hold any position in GameStop (GME), eBay (EBAY), or any related securities.