Netflix king of streaming: beats expectations with 9.3 million new subscribers
New subscribers between January and March were almost double the 4.84 million expected. Turnover and profits also went up. From 2025, however, no more user numbers.
3' min read
3' min read
Netfix puts on a show by lifting the curtain on its latest accounts and confirming itself as the undisputed star on the streaming stage. The results for the first quarter of 2024 consecrated the redemption of the group, which only two years ago had seemed on the ropes and besieged by multiplying competition: it exceeded Wall Street's expectations by gaining9.33 million new subscribers, almost double the expected number, and pushed its total global user base up 16% to close to 270 million. The result was all the more significant because the company was coming off a surge in subscriptions - 13.1 million new arrivals - in the three months immediately preceding.
Attended beats
.Revenues also jumped by almost 15% to $9.3 billion and operating profits improved by 28% to $2.6 billion. Net profits rose 77% to $2.3 billion from $1.30 billion, or $5.28 per share, and beat expectations of $4.52.
Second Quarter Caution
The budget also revealed some challenges. The outlook for the second quarter was disappointing: the 4.49 billion assumed for revenue fell slightly short of analysts' hopes of 4.54 billion. The pace of revenue growth would be 16% in the current quarter (and 13-15% for the year). It was enough to weigh on the stock immediately: on Wall Street, in the after-market, the shares lost ground, over 4 per cent. It must be considered, however, that in the last six months Netflix has gained 112 billion in market capitalisation and since the beginning of the year alone it is up about 30 per cent, among the best stocks of the S&P 500. It has come close again, crossing the $600 mark, its all-time highs. Among analysts, increasingly rosy targets of up to $700 have also been heard in recent weeks.
Subscription boom with advertising
.The quarterly growth, between January and March, was driven by plans with advertising, offered at a lower price, which grew by 65% compared to the same period last year. In the many markets where they are now an option, starting with the US, 40% of new subscribers choose the discounted formula. Continued progress has also been reported in the crackdown on password sharing, which prompts users to incur increased costs for adding family members.
Diversified content
.Among the content that the company pointed out as a recent driver of popularity, in a menu that it wants to be increasingly diversified in order to cater to different tastes, the crime drama 'Griselda' and the science fiction series '3 Body Problem'. Co-CEO Ted Sarandoos, in his conference with analysts, went on to point out that 'we are in the early stages of developing live programmes, which should be seen as an expansion of the type of content we offer, in the same way that we have expanded into movies, unscripted content, animation, and more recently games'.
