On Thursday May 11th, 2023, Walt Disney’s (NYSE: DIS) stock dropped just shy of 9% following the release of the Q2 earnings report. While the feud with Governor DeSantis has not helped its image with a sizable portion of the consumer market, the drop was driven by a loss of 3 millions Disney+ subscriptions from Q1 to Q2 according to Fox Business.
Disney’s struggle to continue growing its subscriber base is not unique in the streaming business, where more and more companies have decided to launch their own platforms as opposed to license it to established players like Netflix. Rising inflation, combined with ever increasing subscription fees across all streaming platforms, is making competition fierce for all.
To reverse the trend of losing Disney+ subscriptions, Disney has planned to merge the app with its other streaming platform Hulu in a similar move to HBO and Discovery’s consolidation. Paramount+ and Showtime have also bundled their services together, and integrated it with Walmart+’s program, itself a competitor to Amazon’s Prime, showing that companies and services are consolidating in an ever competitive market for consumer dollars.
