What Netflix has managed to accomplish in a relatively short amount of time is nothing short of astounding. The streaming giant today boasts more than 125 million subscribers across the globe and shows no signs of slowing down anytime soon. Though Netflix may have had somewhat humble beginnings as a purveyor of DVDs, the company today is a bona-fide media juggernaut with an ever-increasing selection of original, compelling content.
Shares of Netflix have been steadily rising in recent weeks, largely on account of impressive subscriber growth. Since last Friday, Netflix shares are up 25 points and the company earlier today reached a new and downright impressive milestone. With Netflix’s market cap now standing at $161 billion, the company yesterday — for the first time — was worth more than Disney, which boasts a market cap of $152 billion.
Looking ahead, some analysts believe that Netflix still has plenty of room for growth. As we highlighted last week, a recent research note from Bank of America analyst Nat Schindler argues that Netflix’s subscriber base could reach 360 million by 2030.
“We believe Netflix still has a considerable opportunity ahead if it can achieve reasonable penetration levels internationally,” Schindler explained. “Netflix will face varying levels of competition, regulation and economic conditions in each individual market it participates in, but its content scale should allow it to become the dominant streaming player in virtually all markets.”
The absurdity of making tech predictions 12 years out notwithstanding, there’s no question that Netflix’s rapid transformation into a media juggernaut has had an impact on Disney’s strategic roadmap. This past August, Disney announced its plan to start removing its content from Netflix in an effort to bolster its own streaming service which, if all goes according to plan, will go live sometime in late 2019.
