1、To Our Stockholders,Partners,Employees and the eBay Community:A year in review1999 was a historic year for eBay,filled with astonishing growth and rapid change.We began the year with 2.2 million users,a vibrant community about the size of Portland,Oregon and endedthe year with over 10 million confir
2、med registered usersmore than Michigan,the eighth largest state in thecountry.And that phenomenal growth reflected itself in every measure of our business:the number of items listedin 1999 totaled 129.6 million compared to 33.7 million in 1998.In the fourth quarter of 1999,every two tenthsof a secon
3、d,someone,somewhere was listing an item for sale on eBay that translates to$113 dollars of grossmerchandise sales per second.And,most impressive,gross merchandise sales grew an astounding 276 percentfrom$745 million in 1998 to$2.8 billion in 1999.During 1999,our users generated more economic activit
4、y oneBay than on any other consumer e-commerce site.Underlying this strength is the incredible popularity of the site.In 1999,eBay became one of the mostrecognizable Internet brands around the world,with numerous mentions in the media,business press andtelevision.eBay was featured in such high profi
5、le publications as Forbes,the Washington Post and TimeMagazine.In Time magazine,eBay was voted number one in their Best of 1999 in the Cybertech area.eBayalso continues to be mentioned on television shows including Who Wants to be a Millionaire?,TheSimpsons,The Tonight Show,Suddenly Susan,Sports Nig
6、ht and of course,David Lettermans Top TenList.During the year,we endeavored to make eBay a more vibrant marketplace by entering new trading regions.We expanded to reach new areas of the world including the United Kingdom,Australia,Canada and Germany.We entered regional markets to help bring trading