Thanksgiving Sales Up - Good for Ebay and Amazon

Ebay and Amazon are trading higher after good sales data came in from Thanksgiving and Black Friday.  Most retail analysts estimate that there will be a 4.0 to 4.5% growth for holiday sales this year, with ecommerce making up for a dip in store traffic on Black Friday.

Ebay closed trading at $54.88 and Amazon at $338.64.

Piper Jaffray has raised its price target on Amazon to $400 from $350, believing that Amazon will hold its ecommerce market share through the holiday season.

Meanwhile, statistics have shown that eBay monthly users from U.S. have dropped to a new 3 year low. This probably is some concern that Ebay's marketplace is not performing as well as it should be. Icahn Capital LP has been pushing for Ebay to spin off its Paypal business and that could serve as catalyst for the stock.

Carl Icahn Increases Stake in Hertz Global Holdings

Billionaire and activist shareholder Carl Icahn has increased his stake in Hertz Global Holdings. Through Icahn Capital LP, his stake in Hertz has gone up from 8.7% to 10.8%.  This is based on SEC filings which indicates that Icahn now owns  49.3 million shares in the car rental company.  His holdings of Hertz is now over $1.2billion.

Newly appointed CEO, John Tague, has also committed his future and belief in Hertz by investing $2 million of his own money into the company.  

Carl Icahn who is known for being a very active shareholder was already the largest shareholder of Hertz and had pushed for management changes.  Former CEO, Mark Frissora was forced to step down in an accounting error that forced Hertz to restate its earnings for the past 3 years.

Hertz shares had fallen significantly over recent times.  It operates two distinct divisions: (i) car rental segment, and (ii) equipment rental business (e.g. earth moving equipment, construction trucks, etc).  There are plans to split off the equipment rental company into a standalone company.  However, the accounting scandal will probably cause some delays to the plans.  Hertz has also been hurt by safety recalls which means that cars are taken off the road until the necessary repairs are done.

Only for the patient investor perhaps?