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Netflix (NFLX) stock jumped over 14% in pre-market trading on Wednesday after the streaming giant reported a whopping 18.9 million users in the fourth quarter while revenue and earnings also handily beat expectations. It was the biggest quarterly subscriber gain in the company's history.
The company also announced a $15 billion stock buyback and boosted its full-year revenue outlook in its after-hours report on Tuesday. Netflix now projects 2025 revenue between $43.5 billion to $44.5 billion, ahead of the prior $43 billion to $44 billion range.
The strong subscriber gains come as the streamer ended 2024 with two back-to-back NFL games, a successful "Jake Paul vs. Mike Tyson" boxing match, and the return of "Squid Game." To that end, the company said price hikes will be hitting the service — which analysts had consistently teased heading into the print.
"We are adjusting prices today across most plans in the US, Canada, Portugal and Argentina," the company said in the release.
The company is raising the price of its ad-supported plan to $7.99 from the prior $6.99. It's Standard, ad-free tier will now be $17.99, up from $15.49, while its Premium plan will increase by $2 to $24.99. Users who want to add an extra member will now pay $8.99, an increase of $1.
Wall Street had expected the streaming giant to report just 9.18 million subscribers after it secured 13.12 million paying users in Q4 2023. The company announced last spring it would stop reporting the metric at the start of this year.
Netflix's live events boom
On the earnings call, Netflix Co-CEO Greg Peters said the huge jump in subscribers wasn't driven by one particular event, despite its recent live sports programming push.
"We've consistently seen across our history, no single title really drives a majority of our acquisition or engagement," Peters said, noting that live events accounted for a minority of new customers in the quarter.
In November, the Jake Paul and Mike Tyson match attracted over 108 million global viewers, becoming the most-streamed sporting event of all time. For context, the 2024 Super Bowl, which was the most-watched American TV broadcast ever, pulled in 124 million US viewers.
Similarly, the NFL games averaged around 30 million viewers. According to Netflix, it was its most-watched Christmas Day ever in the US. The company will continue to double down on sports amid the recent debut of WWE Raw. Rumors have also swirled the company could bid on UFC rights next.
Netflix said in its shareholder letter it's not focused on rights for "large regular season sports packages; rather, our live strategy is all about delivering can’t-miss, special event programming."
