by Dawn Chmielewski
(Reuters) – Netflix on Tuesday reported a number of new subscribers in the fourth quarter significantly higher than Wall Street expectations, thanks in particular to the final season of the series “The Crown” and the new film “The Killer” of David Fincher.
The American streaming giant rose 7% in after-hours trading, while its stock rose 65% last year.
Over the October-December period, Netflix recorded 13.1 million new subscribers worldwide, a record for a fourth quarter, against a consensus of 8.97 million new customers. This brings the total number of subscribers to the platform to 260 million.
Netflix reported earnings per share of $2.11, compared to analysts’ average forecast of $2.22. The group explained that this resulted in particular from a loss of $239 million linked to exchange rates.
Its quarterly revenue stood at $8.8 billion, beating the consensus and forecast of Netflix itself ($8.7 billion).
The firm said it expects solid double-digit growth for the year 2024, with the arrival of new subscribers and the development of its advertising activities.
While advertising revenue does not make up a significant portion of its revenue, Netflix says it intends for that to change by 2025.
While competition in the streaming market is fierce in the United States, it “becomes clear that Netflix has won the battle”, commented Jessica Reif Ehrlich, analyst at Bank of America.
In a note, she also said that the measures taken by Netflix against the sharing of passwords should help fuel the growth of subscriptions with advertisements.
Netflix says it sees growth opportunities in new areas like gaming and live events. Earlier Tuesday, the group announced a deal worth more than $5 billion to broadcast World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) wrestling programming.
(Reporting Dawn Chmielewski in Los Angeles, with Yuvraj Malik in Bangalore; French version Jean Terzian)
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