The crunch year for Netflix

Now that Disney has launched its own streaming service, the investors in Netflix are wondering whether this company would be able to maintain its growth rate or not. The fact that Disney+ was able to get 10 million customers in just one day after debut has also jolted the confidence of these investors. Some experts have estimated that this new streaming service could end 2019 with nearly 25 million subscribers. Netflix investors are waiting for 21 January when Disney+ announces its results for the 4^th quarter of 2019. They will know then whether the gains of Disney+ are at the expense of Netflix or not.

This is the reason why this last quarter of 2019 is so crucial for the future of Netflix. According to a study done by a market intelligence company, Disney+ app has been downloaded more than 22 million times by the customers. Netflix help centre remains unperturbed, saying it has not seen any impact on the performance of the company so far. This report confirms the fact that mobile sessions of Netflix customers registered a decline for a while though it regained its level after some time.

These findings have been confirmed by Nat Schindler, an analyst from Bank of America. He carried out a survey in which 65% participants said that they do not see Disney+ as a replacement of Netflix. These were the people who had subscribed for Disney+. Only 6.5% of the participants said that they planned to cancel their Netflix subscription after some time. This is a number that is not going to give sleepless nights to Netflix management as a small percentage of subscribers of a company always leave when a new company comes into the market.

However, not everyone believes these stats. There have been several other studies where 25-30% of the early subscribers of Disney+ have confirmed that they either have, or intend to unsubscribe the competing streaming service.

For investors, the most important factor is the number of subscribers, and this is where Netflix has remained the king for a very long time. In the 2^nd quarter of 2019 when Netflix lost hundred thousand subscribers in the domestic market, it gained more than 2.7 million international subscribers. Even though this number fell short of the predicted 5 million additional international subscribers, it was enough to restore the confidence of the investors.

Just how important subscriber base of Netflix is to its investors is reflected by the fact that the company stock lost nearly 20% of its value in 2018 when it could not reach the projected target of 5 million new subscribers.

Even Netflix is not sure of the impact the entry of rival streaming services will have on its performance. However, it is confident that Netflix will do well in the long run on the back of its superior quality service and the opportunities that lie in the market, both domestic as well as international.  You will not miss this sentiment when you talk to the representative of any reliable Netflix help number.