Yesterday, Yahoo announced that PayPal President Scott Thompson is joining Yahoo as new CEO as of January 9th, 2012. With Scott’s departure, eBay CEO John Donahoe will serve as interim president of PayPal.

As you may know, PayPal started as an independent company and was acquired by eBay for $1.5 billion back in 2002. Thompson has been president of PayPal since early 2008. During his leadership, PayPal doubled its user base from 50 million to more than 104 million users worldwide while the revenues grew from $1.8 billion to $4+ billion in 2011.

In an internal memo John Donahoe informed all PayPal employees: “I will serve in the interim role as President and will be meeting with the PayPal leadership team this morning to plan a seamless transition. And while I’m sure Scott’s decision is a shock to many of you, as it was to me, there is one thing I am certain of: PayPal has an enormous opportunity in front of it and we will not slow down. We will not miss a beat. And we will continue driving the incredible momentum that each of you has helped to create.”