Walt Disney Co. reported first-quarter sales, earnings and streaming-subscriber growth that handily beat analysts\u2019 forecasts, giving a boost to a chief executive officer who\u2019s finally out of the shadow of his predecessor.<\/p>\n
Bob Chapek has been CEO of the world\u2019s largest entertainment company for two years this month, but the current period is the first since the departure of longtime Disney leader Bob Iger, who retired as executive chairman in December.<\/p>\n
Disney\u2019s earnings increased to $1.06 a share, well ahead of the 57-cent average of analysts\u2019 estimates.<\/p>\n
Sales in the period ended Jan. 1 increased to $21.8 billion, also topping expectations, the Burbank, California-based entertainment giant said Wednesday.<\/p>\n
The company\u2019s namesake parks and the new Disney+ streaming service delivered big upside surprises, providing a one-two punch that cheered investors and lifted the shares as much as 10% in extended trading.<\/p>\n
Disney\u2019s parks division generated $2.45 billion in operating income, compared with a loss a year earlier.<\/p>\n
Revenue from the resorts unit doubled from lows during the pandemic, helped by the introduction of new services such as Genie+, a system that allows guests to pay an extra fee to jump in shorter lines for rides.<\/p>\n
New subscriptions to Disney+ came in at 11.8 million, far above the 8.17 million that Wall Street had projected, with the total now approaching 130 million.<\/p>\n
Disney shares tumbled in November after the company announced subscriber numbers that fell short of Wall Street projections. Netflix Inc. added to investor worries about streaming growth with a tepid outlook last month.<\/p>\n
Shares of Disney jumped on the latest report, rising as high as $162.10 in extended trading. The stock had declined 4.9% this year through Wednesday\u2019s close in New York.<\/p>\n
Chapek\u2019s accession to CEO, coming just before the pandemic began to spread across the U.S. \u201ccouldn\u2019t have happened at a tougher time,\u201d said Markus Hansen, a money manager with Vontobel Asset Management, which held about 1.77 million Disney shares as of Sept. 30, according to Bloomberg data.<\/p>\n
Chapek\u2019s experience running the theme parks before his promotion likely helped in the company\u2019s recovery.<\/p>\n
\u201cHe\u2019s proved his mettle here,\u201d Hansen said.<\/p>\n
On a call with investors Wednesday, Disney Chief Financial Officer Christine McCarthy said new technologies, such as using mobile phones for hotel check-in and food ordering, have reduced costs. Chapek added that a return of live events and international visitors should boost attendance going forward.<\/p>\n
Like other media companies, Disney has made a big bet that streaming is the future, as consumers increasingly cancel traditional cable TV to watch movies and TV shows online.<\/p>\n
Losses at the direct-to-consumer unit widened to $593 million due to increases in programming, marketing and technology costs.<\/p>\n
Still, the subscriber additions, along with upbeat results from AT&T Inc.\u2019s HBO Max business, are likely to ease investor concerns that the streaming business is slowing,<\/p>\n
Profit in Disney\u2019s traditional TV units, including ESPN and ABC, fell 13% to $1.5 billion, with higher programming costs offsetting increased advertising and fees from cable TV distributors.<\/p>\n
Disney\u2019s content sales unit, which includes films, reported a loss of $98 million, with theaters still struggling and losses on pictures released outweighing revenue from home entertainment.<\/p>\n
Films released in the quarter included notable box office disappointments \u201cWest Side Story\u201d and \u201cThe Last Duel.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Disney+ streaming service may have gotten a lift from the recent film \u201cEncanto,\u201d which was released for streaming on Christmas Eve.<\/p>\n
The animated musical delivered modest results at the box office but has really\u00a0taken off<\/a><\/strong>\u00a0online.<\/p>\n \u201cEncanto\u201d was the most-watched film on streaming in the two weeks after its release on Disney+, according to Nielsen.<\/p>\n Both the soundtrack album and the song \u201cWe Don\u2019t Talk About Bruno\u201d are No. 1 on the Billboard charts.<\/p>\n The past quarter also saw streaming releases for \u201cThe Beatles: Get Back\u201d and a new series based on the Star Wars character Boba Fett.<\/p>\n Chapek said \u201cEncanto\u201d underscores that Disney can still turn movies into valuable properties, even with families and older adults shunning movie theaters due to the pandemic.<\/p>\n \u201cWe\u2019d love for theatrical to come back for family movies,\u201d Chapek said in an interview on Bloomberg TV. \u201cWe hope it does, but if it doesn\u2019t we know that we\u2019re very secure in being able to use our own platform Disney+ to help do that.\u201d<\/p>\n Walt Disney Co. reported first-quarter sales, earnings and streaming-subscriber growth that handily beat analysts\u2019 forecasts, giving a boost to a chief executive officer who\u2019s finally out of the shadow of his predecessor.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":341034,"featured_media":409712,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_sma_x_autopost_status":"idle","_sma_x_autopost_error":"","_sma_x_post_id":"","_sma_facebook_post_id":"","_sma_instagram_post_id":"","_sma_threads_post_id":"","_sma_x_attempts":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[24],"tags":[71754,43182,12857,61603,62312],"class_list":["post-433400","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-broadcasting","tag-bob-chapek","tag-bob-iger","tag-disney","tag-hbo-max","tag-video-streaming-services"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433400"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/341034"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=433400"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/433400\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/409712"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=433400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=433400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mybroadband.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=433400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Now read: DStv price hikes for 2022<\/a><\/h3>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"