PayPal Faces October 27 Reckoning as AI Commerce Revenue Slips to 2028

PayPal's next earnings call, scheduled for October 27, will give investors their first hard numbers against a backdrop of mounting skepticism — and a strategic overhaul whose payoff, by management's own admission, sits years away.

Two downgrades in the space of a week have sharpened the focus on the core payments business. Cleveland Research cut PayPal from "Neutral" to "Underperform" on Monday, pointing to softer trends in the third quarter of 2026, market-share losses and broader macroeconomic pressure. The firm flagged weakening international volumes in the branded business, pricing pressure across both branded checkout and Braintree, and only limited incremental volume from later-pay product placements. That critique lands not just on growth rates but on the effectiveness of individual growth initiatives.

Bank of America Securities had already moved to "Underperform" on October 15, with analyst Matthew O'Neill setting a $53 price target. O'Neill expects the overhaul's levers to take hold in 2027 at the earliest, citing pricing pressure at Braintree and slower branded-checkout growth. The timing matters: a strategic reset, on that view, will not offset near-term operational strain.

A Leaner Organization, Not Yet a Proven One

CEO Enrique Lores used the Money20/20 stage to lay out the internal side of the turnaround, calling for faster decisions, fewer management layers and clearer accountability. A day earlier, he had sketched plans to expand consumer financial services. Together, the remarks span both the company's own structure and its customer offering — but they describe direction, not delivered results.

That distinction is central for shareholders. A flatter leadership structure may speed execution; whether it produces better business outcomes is a question the coming quarterly figures can inform but cannot settle.

Lores was equally candid about the timeline for agentic commerce. Revenue from AI-driven shopping, he said Tuesday, should not be expected before 2028. That pushes the existing payment franchises and the announced organizational changes to the foreground.

Glance Deal Widens the Funnel, Not the Top Line

The clearest concrete step on the AI front came on October 15, when PayPal unveiled an integration with Glance. The arrangement brings embedded PayPal checkout and real-time product data onto the AI shopping platform, letting U.S. users browse and pay within that environment.

Glance says its platform reaches more than 60 million mobile and connected TV devices. That footprint represents a potential customer channel — it does not translate into an equivalent number of PayPal users, nor into revenue already booked.

So the partnership and Lores' timeline are not in conflict. PayPal can open additional shopping routes while meaningful revenue from AI-agent commerce remains some way off. What the integration does not do is answer the near-term question.

What to Watch on October 27

The immediate test comes from the established business. Investors will be looking closely at branded checkout, pricing trends at Braintree and any commentary on how quickly the restructuring is moving. The key issue is whether PayPal confirms the operational weakness analysts fear or offers solid counter-evidence.

Cleveland Research's findings are expectations formed ahead of the release, not reported quarterly results — a point worth keeping in view as the call approaches. Longer-range AI ambitions cannot substitute for that examination of the core.