[crazygringo]

Not smart. If a recession is coming, the last thing you want is to reduce your revenue in advance. Or during! That's like saying, better to take some poison now if there's a flu going around I might catch!

And yes their profitability has gone up. Due to massive cuts. Slashing stores, slashing normal investment in stores, and laying off everyone they can.

This is what you do when your business model is completely failing -- you stop all normal investment that sustains the business for the long term, so you can make more profit in the short term. But it's not sustainable. It's what happens when you realize you're going out of business, and you want to take out as much money as you can, while you still can.

So the increased profit isn't a good sign in this case. It's precisely the opposite -- the end is near for this business model. It is indeed sinking.

And their desperate and nonsensical bid for eBay is another sign of this -- a kind of Hail Mary pass since their original business model is busted.