Oct. 22 (Bloomberg) -- EBay Inc., the most visited U.S. e- commerce site, slumped in Nasdaq trading after a shift to faster-growing yet lower-margin businesses hampered its profit forecast.

Excluding some costs, fourth-quarter earnings will be 38 cents to 40 cents a share, the San Jose, California-based company said yesterday. The midpoint of that range missed the 40 cents predicted by analysts in a Bloomberg survey.

Chief Executive Officer John Donahoe, who took over last year, is steering EBay toward fixed-price sales and away from its former hallmark of auctions. He’s also building up the company’s PayPal and Bill Me Later payment services, which carry lower profit margins. And EBay is offloading its Skype Internet- phone unit -- a move that will hurt profit this quarter -- because the business doesn’t fit with the rest of the company.

“People are just looking at the earnings guidance for the fourth quarter, which is a little below the Street’s expectations,” said Aaron Kessler, an analyst at Kaufman Bros. in San Francisco. He recommends buying the shares and doesn’t own any. “They’re heading in the right direction. It’s not going to be an easy road.”

EBay fell $1.06, or 4.2 percent, to $23.97 at 4 p.m. New York time on the Nasdaq Stock Market. The shares have gained 72 percent this year.

Skype Breakup

EBay’s forecast didn’t include a full quarter’s worth of results from Skype, a business that lets users place calls over the Internet. The company expects to complete the sale of Skype about halfway through the quarter.

Third-quarter net income declined 29 percent to $349.7 million, or 27 cents a share, from $492.2 million, or 38 cents, a year earlier. Sales rose to $2.24 billion, topping estimates of $2.14 billion. Excluding some items, earnings were 38 cents a share, compared with the 37 cents predicted by analysts.

Sales this quarter will be $2.2 billion to $2.3 billion, EBay said. Analysts had projected $2.26 billion.

EBay’s Marketplaces unit, which includes its main site, StubHub and Shopping.com, grew 4 percent last quarter, excluding currency fluctuations. That likely outpaced the broader e- commerce market, Donahoe said.

“We’re seeing progress on our turnaround,” he said in an interview. “People are buying with more frequency on EBay than in the market.”

Forrester Research Inc. predicts that total online sales in the U.S. will expand 13 percent next year and 10 percent in 2011.

Comeback Plan

EBay’s turnaround plan has included changing listing fees and fighting fraud. The company also has revamped its search feature to make it easier to find items.

This month, EBay said it would eliminate about 60 workers. It also announced plans in May to close a 700-person customer- service office in Vancouver.

While EBay attracts more visitors than any other U.S. e- commerce site, it has lost customers to Amazon.com Inc., the world’s largest online retailer. The shift toward fixed-price transactions is an effort to tap faster-growing markets.

EBay is selling Skype to a group of investors led by private-equity firm Silver Lake. EBay had originally planned to spin off Skype as an initial public offering, saying the business had little synergy with the parent company.

Skype’s revenue rose 29 percent to $185.2 million last quarter. The service added 40.3 million users in the period and now has more than 520.8 million in total.

Excluding Skype’s 13-cent per-share contribution to earnings, EBay’s profit for the full year will be $1.41 to $1.43, the company said.

Revenue at EBay’s payments business advanced 15 percent to $688.1 million last quarter. Active accounts rose 19 percent to 78 million as the service began working with more Web sites.

PayPal competes with Discover Financial Services and Visa Inc., as well as smaller companies such as Obopay Inc. EBay expects PayPal to eventually become its biggest business, with revenue reaching $5 billion by 2011.

To contact the reporter on this story: Joseph Galante in San Francisco at jgalante3@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: October 22, 2009 16:10 EDT