Netflix rises as Oppenheimer upgrades on expectations that ad tier will boost subscribers
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Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) shares rose on Monday after investment firm Oppenheimer upgraded the streaming media giant, noting its eventual launch of an advertising-supported tier should boost subscriber growth and raise its average revenue per user.
Analyst Jason Helfstein raised his rating to outperform from perform, noting that in addition to the increase in subscribers and jump in average revenue per user, the new tier is likely to slow churn, the industry's term for how many subscribers leave a service.
"Netflix is in a unique position to aggregate large audiences and control the timing of series launches for top-tier advertisers, commanding high [cost per thousand views]," Helfstein wrote in a note to clients.
Netflix (NFLX) shares gained 1.5% to $243.70 in premarket trading.
In addition, Helfstein said he expects $4.6B in advertising revenue in 2025, with a total of $42.4B in revenue and 282M subscribers for Netflix (NFLX), above Wall Street estimates. 
Although Netflix (NFLX) has said that the advertising tier will be available in the early part of 2023, some have postulated that it could be available as soon as November 1. 
Last week, investment firm Evercore upgraded Netflix (NFLX) to outperform after conducting some surveys and performing analysis of the company's advertising opportunity.
Analysts are overwhelmingly cautious on Netflix (NFLX). It has a HOLD rating from Seeking Alpha authors, while Wall Street analysts rate it a HOLD. Conversely, Seeking Alpha's quant system, which consistently beats the market, rates NFLX a HOLD.