Netflix Inc. forecast third-quarter revenue that fell short of Wall Street estimates, suggesting a crackdown on password sharing and a new advertising strategy aren’t yet delivering the sales growth analysts anticipated.
The shares declined as much as 6% to $448.88 in extended trading, after rising 62% this year through the close on Wednesday.
The numbers are fine “but not enough to move the stock higher given the move in past three months,” LightShed Partners analyst Rich Greenfield said after the earnings release.
Netflix’s second-quarter sales rose 2.7% to $8.19 billion, coming in slightly below analysts’ projections. That was due in part to foreign exchange rates and to price cuts in some markets.
The company’s forecast for third-quarter revenue of $8.52 billion was also shy of Wall Street estimates, which average $8.67 billion. The company said revenue from advertising and add-on memberships to people who share passwords were not material enough to offset other factors, such as a lack of price increases.
“While we’ve made steady progress this year, we have more work to do to reaccelerate our growth,” the company said.
The shortfall overshadowed a solid quarter of subscriber growth. Netflix added 5.89 million customers in the second period, more than doubling Wall Street estimates after cracking down on people who share their passwords.
The results marked the company’s best second quarter since the depths of the pandemic three years ago and far surpassed Wall Street forecasts of 2.07 million new subscribers. Management expects similar growth this period.
Earlier Wednesday, Netflix eliminated its lowest-priced ad-free plan, pushing consumers toward a lower-priced, ad-backed service or a costlier commercial-free plan.
In May, the streaming leader started charging people in more than 100 countries to continue sharing their passwords, a key part of its plan to accelerate growth after a sluggish 2022. Viewers using someone else’s subscription can now either pay to keep sharing or set up their own account.
The plan has been controversial with users, and analysts weren’t sure how it would impact the company’s growth. Netflix had warned that it would see an uptick in cancellations at the start of the crackdown and that it would see more growth in the back half of this year.
But in recent weeks, third-party data indicated that Netflix was seeing a surge in customers.
The company said new sign-ups are already exceeding cancellations and that sales growth will accelerate in the months ahead, with third-quarter growth projected at 7.5%.
Netflix finished the quarter with 238.4 million members, up 8% from a year ago.
While analysts have raised concerns about losses from streaming at many of Netflix’s competitors, including Walt Disney Co. and Warner Bros. Discovery Inc., Netflix is delivering higher profit quarter after quarter. Second-quarter earnings, at $3.29 a share, beat the $2.85 a share average of analyst estimates.
“While streaming is intensely competitive, we’ve shown that with strong execution and focus, it can be a great business,” the company said in a letter to shareholders.
The company raised its 2023 forecast for free cash flow to $5 billion, from at least $3.5 billion previously, as a result of a strike by writers and actors, which has shuttered production and cut spending.
The password crackdown will provide a temporary boost in subscribers. Netflix had long said it didn’t care if people used someone else’s account. But that was when it was adding more than 25 million customers a year. Netflix lost customers in the first half of 2022, prompting a steep drop in the shares and leading to a selloff in other media stocks.
(Updates with analyst comment in third paragraph. The sales estimate for the third quarter was corrected in an earlier version of this story.)
