eBay Phils sees online deals growing by over 30% this year

Manila, Philippines - eBay Philippines, the country’s leading e-commerce marketplace, expects the volume of online transactions to grow by more than 20 to 30 percent this year compared to last year.

“We expect to grow at a much higher level than the market growth of 20 to 30 percent,” officials said.

eBay Phils., a subsidiary of eBay Inc. which is the world’s largest online marketplace, has over 750,000 registered users.

About 3,000 sellers here use eBay as a primary or secondary source of income.

eBay Phils. country manager Ambareesh Murty and business head Abhimanyu Lal said that while e-commerce here is still nascent, it has been growing

very well and is showing significant promise, especially with the rapid increase in Internet and broadband penetration.

“We expect a very high market growth in the next two to three years,” they said.

The country’s Internet penetration rate has increased from three percent in 2000 to 30 percent last year. “Broadband penetration, especially mobile, is a major driver that will further fuel e-commerce growth in the Philippines,” they added.

A survey done by Mastercard showed that one in every two online Filipinos (or 15 million of the 30 million online) will consider making online purchases over the next six months.

Company officials revealed that the top e-commerce hubs in the country are Metro Manila, Cebu, Davao, Cabanatuan, Baguio, Angeles City, Iloilo,Bacolod, Laoag, and Antipolo.

In the Philippines, clothes, shoes and accessories are the largesr categories in eBay.

E-commerce has become mainstream here. At any given time, there are over 400,000 live listings on eBay Phils. Thousands of sellers sell daily across 2,000 categories of products.

In fact, a piece of clothing sells every three minutes, toys every four minutes,

handbags every six minutes, a piece of home decor every 31 minutes in the Philippines, they noted.

Murty said that in the Philippines, over 50 percent of registered users on eBay Phils. are women while 74 percent of online shoppers bought in the lifestyle category followed by technology.