Netflix far exceeded expectations with an increase of over 13 million customers in the last quarter. The streaming market leader now has more than 260 million paying customer households. The continued rapid growth could further increase the pressure on smaller streaming rivals.
In recent months, Netflix has cracked down on free riders who access the service with passwords from friends or family members with whom they do not live in the same household. The numbers show that Netflix’s calculations paid off and many of the affected users remain loyal to the service, even if it costs money. As the company cracked down on password sharing, the cheapest subscription version grew in popularity with advertising. Sales rose by 12.5 percent year-on-year to a good 8.83 billion dollars (8.14 billion euros). That was also above analysts’ expectations.
At $2.11 per share, the surplus fell short of the expected $2.22. Netflix blamed negative exchange rate effects totaling $239 million for this. The company forecast double-digit percentage growth for the current year.