Mumbai: In the third quarter ending September 30, 2022, Netflix reported 2.41 million net new paid subscribers. It now has 223.1 million paid subscribers globally. Earlier, the expectation was to gain one million subscribers. The expectation for Q4 is 4.5 million paid net additions versus 8.3 million in Q4 2021.
The company said that after a challenging first half, it believes that it is on a path to reaccelerate growth. The key, it says, lies in pleasing members. Its focus has always rested on winning the competition for viewing every day. When its series and movies excite members, they tell their friends, and then more people watch, join, and stay with the platform.
Speaking about competition, it said that while competitors are investing heavily to drive subscribers and engagement, building a large, successful streaming business is hard. Netflix estimates that they are all losing money, with combined 2022 operating losses of well over $10 billion, versus Netflix’s five to six billion dollars annual operating profit.
For incumbent entertainment companies, this high level of investment is understandable given the accelerating decline of linear TV, which currently generates the bulk of their profit. Ultimately, though, Netflix believes that some of its competitors will seek to build sustainable, profitable businesses in streaming—either on their own or through continued industry consolidation. While it’s early days, we are starting to see this increased profit focus—with some raising prices for their streaming services, some reigning in content spending, and some retrenching around traditional operating models which may dilute their direct-to-consumer offering. Amidst this formidable and diverse set of competitors, it believes that its focus as a pure-play streaming business is an advantage. Netflix explains that its aim remains to be the first choice in entertainment and to continue to build an amazingly successful and profitable business.
Netflix said that it operates in a highly competitive industry where people have many different entertainment choices—from linear TV to streaming, YouTube to TikTok, and gaming to social media. The silver lining is that the opportunity is very large and growing, and Netflix is still very small relative to that opportunity (for example, eight per cent of total TV time in the US and the UK, two of its most established countries). Its annual revenue of $30 billion or more in the 190 countries in which it operates is roughly five per cent of the combined estimated $300 billion pay TV/streaming industry, $180 billion branded advertising market, and $130 billion consumers spend annually on gaming. So, Netflix believes that it has a long runway for growth if it can continue to improve its offering steadily over time.
Netflix also stated that its six per cent year-over-year revenue growth in Q3 was driven by a five per cent increase in average paid memberships and a one per cent increase in average revenue per membership (ARM). Excluding the impact of foreign exchange (F/X), revenue and ARM grew 13 per cent and eight per cent year-over-year, respectively. The sequential decline in revenue was entirely due to F/X.
In the third quarter of the fiscal year in the Asia Pacific region, revenue grew by 19 per cent, excluding F/X, as average paid memberships rose 23 per cent year-over-year. ARM fell three per cent year on year, excluding F/X, owing in part to lower ARM in India. This was somewhat offset by higher ARM in Australia and Korea. It added 1.4 million paid memberships in the region (versus 2.2 million in the last Q3).
Excluding F/X, EMEA revenue and ARM grew 13 per cent and seven per cent, respectively. Paid net additions totaled 0.6 million, down from 1.8 million in the previous quarter. In Latin America, revenue increased 19 per cent year-over-year, supported by ARM growth of 16 per cent vs. the year ago quarter excluding F/X. It added 0.3 million paid memberships, in line with membership growth in Q3’21. ARM and revenue grew by 12 per cent and 11 per cent, respectively, in the US and Canada, which is its most penetrated market. Paid net adds totalled 0.1 million (similar to the 0.1 million in Q3’21).
For Q4 of 2022, it is expecting revenue of $7.8 billion, with the sequential decline entirely due to the continued strengthening of the US dollar vs. other currencies. On a constant currency basis, this equates to nine per cent year-over-year revenue growth. The revenue growth forecast is driven by the expectation of 4.5 million paid net ads (vs. 8.3 million in Q4 ’21) and ARM growth of six per cent year-over-year, excluding F/X. The paid net adds forecast assumes that it experiences its usual seasonality as well as the impact of a strong content slate, counterbalanced by macroeconomic weakness, which leads to less-than-normal visibility. While it is very optimistic about the new advertising business, the company does not expect a material contribution in Q4 2022 as it is launching its Basic with Ads plan intra-quarter and anticipates gradually growing its membership in that plan. Its aim is to give prospective new members more choice—not switch members off from their current plans.
Members who don’t want to change will remain on their current plan, without ads, at the current price, the company explains. It has forecasted a Q4 2022 operating margin of four per cent compared to eight per cent in the year-ago period. The fourth quarter is typically its lowest operating margin quarter of the year as it is usually its largest quarter in terms of content and marketing spend.
