UPDATED Netflix Delivers Massive Subscription Growth
UPDATED: Netflix has reported revenues of $2.48 billion, the content delivery Company who has restricted Foxtel growth in Australia, exceeded its own subscriber growth, gaining 7.05 million new subscribers rather than the forecast 5.2 million.
Netflix said this represented the biggest quarterly gain in subscribers in the company’s history.
Wall Street greeted the robust subscriber numbers with enthusiasm, causing Netflix shares to trade up as much as 8.4% after hours.
International expansion (Netflix is now available in 190 countries including Australia.) and new original content has helped fuel Netflix’s growth.
In 2016 Netflix said it planned to release 1,000 hours of new original content–a significant expansion of its current library of 600 hours of original shows and movies. Since its initial push into original content with House of Cards in 2013, Netflix’ original shows have continued to gain critical acclaim, most recently with two Golden Globe Awards going to The Crown. “Netflix is increasing overall content spending this year and specifically focusing on original programming,”
eMarketer analyst Paul Verna said. “This is both a reflection of the company’s success in using high-quality originals to attract subscribers and a recognition that its competitors are also doubling down on exclusive content.”
Netflix also took the unusual step of sounding off on U.S. domestic policy in its earnings report. Net neutrality regulations could change in 2017 under the Trump administration and a Republican-dominated Congress. While Netflix expressed confidence any net neutrality changes wouldn’t affect its bottom line, the company still emphasized the importance of those regulations. “On a public policy basis, however, strong net neutrality is important to support innovation and smaller firms,” Netflix sad. in the earnings release. “No one wants ISPs to decide what new and potentially disruptive services can operate over their networks, or to favor one service over another. We hope the new US administration and Congress will recognize that keeping the network neutral drives job growth and innovation.”
Netflix who has beeen credited with driving sales of Ultra High Definition TV’s in Australia in 2016, due to their 4K original series content is set to announce a whopping 30% rise in profits.
The value of Netflix stock has risen sharply in recent months, with a 10% jump for the trailing 12-month period and a 35% increase in just the last three months. International expansion (Netflix is now available in 190 countries including Australia) and new original content has helped fuel Netflix’ growth.
In 2016 Netflix said it planned to release 1,000 hours of new original content–an significant expansion of its current library of 600 hours of original shows and movies. Since its initial push into original content with House of Cards in 2013, Netflix’ original shows have continued to gain critical acclaim, most recently with two Golden Globe Awards going to The Crown. “Netflix is increasing overall content spending this year and specifically focusing on original programming,” eMarketer analyst Paul Verna said. “This is both a reflection of the company’s success in using high-quality originals to attract subscribers and a recognition that its competitors are also doubling down on exclusive content.”
Moving forward, however, Netfix will need to compete with non-traditional sources of TV programming. “This competitive field includes not just full-episode players like Hulu and Amazon, but also YouTube and Facebook, which are committing more and more resources to full-length programming,” Verna said.