Disney+ Days grow as gangbusters seem good and finally end. Disney actions have been slightly reduced on Wednesday after their release of profits for the last three months of 2024, which included the news that its homonym transmission service lost 700,000 subscribers. The company expects a greater “modest” decrease until 2025, perhaps the consequence of successive price increases, the institution of repression in password exchange and a reduction in content spending. Hulu was a brilliant point, adding 1.6 million subscribers.
Disney+ now has 124.6 million subscribers, compared to 125.3 million, while Hulu is at 53.6 million subscribers, compared to 52 million. In general, Disney’s financial performance exceeded expectations, with profits per share of $ 1.76 in revenues of $ 24.7 billion. Wall Street analysts were waiting for $ 1.43 for share at $ 24.55 billion in revenues. Disney parks did it particularly well, another place where the company has increased prices in recent years.
After Bob Iger returned as CEO in 2022 after a short duration retire , with the final three months of 2024, marking its third consecutive trimester of the transmission profitability. That has required to be more fiscally responsible and make your transmission services less attractive, even by increasing prices, introducing a level with ads and more recently to share passwords.
Disney+ received many criticisms from fans who said the company was causing fatigue and watering its IP by producing too much new content. After returning to the helm, Iger said Disney would reduce the amount of content it produced with the aim of improving the general quality and profitability of the transmission after several years of pumping monumental content to try to compete against Netflix. Investors in Wall Street agreed with heavy content spending for some time, but finally began to demand that the tastes of Disney and Warner Bros. stop bleeding cash and begin to return the profits.
Netflix has only continued to grow and maintain its leadership as the clear winner in the transmission. A added register 19 million subscribers To close 2024, with total subscribers that cross 300 million, and has found success with its introduction of an advertising level and incursion into live content, two initiatives that were unthinkable in the past. Netflix becomes richer and richer, while the rest of the transmission industry resembles those they have done.
The problem for Disney and other competitors to Netflix is that their catalogs remain much smaller, and user rotation is high. Consumers will register for a service, they will see a new season of their favorite program and then cancel. Netflix does it I don’t have the same rotation problem Because it has a large content portfolio and continues to spend $ 17-18 billion per year on new content. It does not help Disney+ is more oriented to children and adolescents, which limits its appeal; How many times people really want to see again? The Simpsons? Disney hopes to spend $ 24 billion in 2025 on new content, but 40% of that goes to sports rights; Spending on new television and films programs could decrease.
Fortunately for Disney, he is still the king of children’s programming, and was able to launch some successful films in 2024 after several years of successive failures such as “Lightyear” and “Strange World”. At least for parents, Disney+ will probably remain in the monthly credit card status. The other Disney service, ESPN+, could be a bright point as more sports move towards transmission.