AMC Entertainment beats estimates, exploring creation of cryptocurrency

Yahoo Finance's Julie Hyman talks AMC earnings and the company's exploration of creating its own cryptocurrency.

Video transcript

JULIE HYMAN: Well, General Electric, for all of its sort of declining fortunes, has still been a favorite of some retail traders. So, too, has this company, AMC, although it's a much newer darling of retail traders, shall we say. And this company came out and beat estimates or recorded revenue that was ahead of estimates, recorded a smaller loss than analysts had been anticipating.

AMC also, as is usual, talking about stuff that has nothing to do with its core business on the conference call, including exploring the creation of its own cryptocurrency. It's talking with Hollywood studios about maybe making NFTs tied to major films, talking about selling popcorn as a retail business. I'm not quite sure what that's all about.

The shares, though, are down this morning, guys. And some analysts are saying, well, domestically, its market share did not necessarily hold up. So I don't know. Is this-- Soz, Brian Sozzi, is this stock trading on fundamentals this morning? I don't-- I don't even know how reactions to a company like AMC work anymore.

BRIAN SOZZI: Yeah. It is pretty-- it was pretty funny to hear AMC on the call talk about how they have looked at launching their own cryptocurrency. And I tweeted at CEO Adam Aron this morning. I think they should name it popcorn. But maybe that's just me.

And on your question of-- on your question-- or soda. Either one of them. One, your question of fundamentals-- no, I don't think it is, Julie, because on the call, they did talk about attendance in October was 72% of October 2019 or pre-pandemic. I like that number, and I have been very critical of AMC. I think it gives you some hope that the holiday season or the fourth quarter for AMC may not be that bad. People do want to go back to the movies here. And that was a very important indication here. So if you do see a reversal in the stock in the green today, I think investors can look to that as the reason why.

EMILY MCCORMICK: And we have to keep in mind here that this stock is still up some 2,000% so far for the year to date. So a 5% decline in the pre-market is maybe just a little bit of profit taking here for shares that have had such an extraordinary run up so far over 2021 and, of course, that meme stock frenzy at the beginning of the year being a big contributor to that here.

But speaking of the meme stock frenzy and just the influx of demand that has come out of that because of these retail traders here, I think CEO Adam Aron has, of course, been one of the big proponents of this, has really been trying to capitalize here. And I think the move or potential move towards creating its own cryptocurrency or creating NFTs of some of these Hollywood studio blockbusters just really speaks to that trend. I mean, if we look back in September, some of these moves that Adam Aron had been making here, he actually asked his Twitter followers if AMC should accept Dogecoin for payment. He'd already said that the movie theater would accept Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Ethereum, and Litecoin by the end of the year for some payments as well.

So I think really trying to capitalize here on the fact that he knows that retail investors are interested in these companies. He's trying to make headlines here. It's almost like free marketing for AMC Entertainment. And overall, again, the company did actually top top and bottom line results for the third quarter. So seeing a little bit of some fundamental drivers here as well, guys.

JULIE HYMAN: And of course, the AMC supporters are known as apes and Adam Aron, the CEO, they call the silverback, which is always a fun little tidbit here.