Netflix's 2Q subscriber growth surges in a sign that crackdown on password sharing is paying off

abcnews.go.com:

Netflix enjoyed its biggest springtime spurt in subscribers since the early days of the pandemic three years ago, providing the latest sign that a recent crackdown on password sharing and the rollout of a cheaper version of its video streaming service ...

SAN FRANCISCO — Netflix enjoyed its biggest springtime spurt in subscribers since the early days of the pandemic three years ago, providing the latest sign that a recent crackdown on password sharing and the rollout of a cheaper version of its video streaming service are paying off.

The video streaming service added 5.9 million subscribers during the April-June period, according to numbers released Wednesday along with its latest quarterly financial results. The gains easily surpassed the roughly 2.2 million additional subscribers that analysts surveyed by FactSet Research had anticipating. Netflix ended June with 238.4 million worldwide subscribers.

Investors seemed unsatisfied, perhaps rattled by management commentary in a shareholder letter warning “quite a competitive battle” continuing to unfold against the backdrop of ongoing strikes by both the writers and actors union in the U.S. that is already bogging down much of Hollywood and threatening to clog the pipelines feeding entertainment to streaming services. Netflix's stock price fell 4% in Wednesday's extended trading. The decline also could have reflected some investor locking in profits that have accrued while the shares have climbed by more than 50% so far this year.

The second-quarter performance marked Netflix’s biggest spring —- traditionally the company's slowest stretch of growth — since gaining 10 million subscribers during the same period in 2020 under dramatically different market conditions.

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