Meg Whitman was given a standing ovation at last week's gathering of the Ebay faithful in Las Vegas. For the thousands of online sellers who had packed in to the Mandalay Bay convention centre for the annual convocation, this felt more like revivalist meetings than a normal business conference.

The Wall Street crowd, however, is less enthralled with her recent performance. Shares in the world's biggest e-commerce company halved over the past 18 months over concerns that its markets are maturing. No matter that Ms Whitman, a veteran of the consumer products industry who has run Ebay for eight years, has since revived Ebay's slowing businesses in the US and Germany, its two biggest markets: for many investors, the company is becoming middle-aged, and may be outflanked by Google and other younger rivals.