Zennstrom made his disclosure far away from where Meg Whitman or anyone else at eBay could possibly lay hands on him. Now focused on video site Joost, and paid off by eBay, he said what many believed of the Skype deal anyway.

"We had to chart the trajectory of growth and how fast that would run, (but) we found out that was a bit front-loaded," Reuters cited Zennstrom as saying at the annual ETRE technology conference in Hungary.

"We overshot in terms of monetization … Our position in the market has strengthened … you need to look at the long-term value of companies," he continued.

Between the payoff and the writing-down of certain expenses, eBay will take a big $1.43 billion pounding to its third quarter financials. EBay plans to announce those figures on October 17 after the market closes.

We don’t anticipate Zennstrom offering eBay a refund on its overvaluation.