eBay has had a troubled year, with activist investor Carl Icahn pressuring the company to separate its growing online payments service away from its core business. Although eBay won a proxy battle to prevent that from happening, it's now decided to do so of its own volition. The split is expected to complete by the middle of 2015, allowing PayPal and eBay to operate at "arm's length" from each another, and hopefully helping PayPal to expand its payment offerings to fight against the likes of Apple Pay and Square.