PayPal Holdings stock was rising sharply early Wednesday following a report it has received a takeover offer valuing the payments company at more than $53 billion.

Privately held payments company Stripe and private-equity firm Advent International have teamed up on a bid that values PayPal at $60.50 per share, Reuters reported, citing people familiar with the matter.

PayPal shares were up 15% at $54.40 in premarket trading. The stock has fallen 35% in the past 12 months through to Tuesday's close and has plummeted from its peak of more than $300 a share in 2021

Advent declined to comment on the report. PayPal and Stripe didn't immediately respond to requests for comment from Barron's early on Wednesday.

The reported approach wouldn't come as a complete shock -- a similar report about Stripe's potential interest in PayPal came in February. However, Wall Street analysts said at the time that the size of the company and its multiple different operations made the sale of the entire business difficult.

Stripe and Advent plan to jointly own PayPal via equal stakes rather than looking to break it up, according to Reuters.

PayPal processes nearly $2 trillion in payment volumes annually, has just under 440 million active accounts, and owns the most prominent U.S. peer-to-peer network in Venmo. It is one of just four globally recognized payment networks, alongside Mastercard, Visa, and American Express.

The company recently said a reorganization would separate its three business segments: checkout, consumer financial services, and payment processing.

However, PayPal's branded checkout business, which allows merchants to convert sales through the company's platform, has been under pressure, which contributed to poorly-received earnings in May.

Write to Adam Clark at adam.clark@barrons.com

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July 15, 2026 04:47 ET (08:47 GMT)

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