Netflix gains as report shows subscriber spike after password crackdown
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Netflix (NASDAQ:NFLX) came out of the opening gate up 2.4% Friday as early indications show that subscriber uptake has been strong after the streamer's password crackdown in the United States.
The company took some long-running tests in other countries to limit account sharing between households and brought them to its home market nearly three weeks ago. Netflix's approach involved urging members to restrict usage to one household and prodding them to buy extra memberships (at a lower rate) for those sharing from outside.
That's resulted in a big bump to subscribers, according to researchers at Antenna.
Average daily sign-ups to Netflix hit 73,000 during the period just after announcing the U.S. move, a 102% increase from its 60-day average -- topping even the sign-up spike that Netflix saw during initial COVID-19 lockdowns, Antenna noted.
Since alerting subscribers in the United States that it would begin to curb password sharing on May 23, 2023, Netflix has had the four single largest days of U.S. user acquisition in the four and a half years that Antenna has been measuring the streaming service," the firm noted. "Based on the most current data available, Netflix saw nearly 100,000 daily Sign-ups on both May 26 and May 27.
Cancellations also increased, Antenna said, but not as much as sign-ups did: The ratio of sign-ups to cancellations was up 25.6% vs. the previous 60 days.
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