New Netflix Subscriber And Revenue Figures Underscore Boom Outside U.S.

Dade Hayes

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Emphasizing its surge in growth internationally as its domestic business settles into a more sedate pattern, Netflix released three years of revenue and subscription figures Monday.

More than half of the company’s 158 million global subscribers and 90% of its growth is coming outside of the U.S. at this point. Europe, the Middle East and Africa [EMEA] saw a 140% increase in subscribers and 196% in revenue from the first quarter of 2017 to the third quarter of 2019. While Netflix is a newer player in the Asia-Pacific region, where it has fewer than 15 million subscribers, its subscriber numbers have jumped 211% in members and revenue climbed 229% since 2017.

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Latin America, according to the new figures, has already pulled in more than $2 billion in revenue from its 29.4 million subscribers in 2019. In 2017, the region took in $1.6 billion in revenue and had 19.7 million subscribers.

In the U.S. and Canada, the total number of paid streaming subscribers at the end of the third quarter of 2019 (September 30) at 67.1 million. That was up from 58.4 million at the end of 2017. Similarly, total revenue in the U.S. and Canada approached $7.4 billion by the most recent quarter, up from $6.7 billion for the full year 2017. In 2018, however, revenue reached nearly $8.3 billion.

The growth trajectory for the U.S. alone, without Canada, has flattened considerably, with the company reporting a domestic downturn in subscribers last summer, its first in eight years. A handful of billion-dollar rivals to Netflix — among them Apple TV+, Disney+, HBO Max and Peacock — are in the process of reaching the market. While there continues to be skepticism in some pockets of Wall Street and the entertainment business about the sustainability of the Netflix model, investors have not jumped ship. Shares in Netflix are trading slightly below where they were at the start of the year, but have gained slightly since the November launches by Disney and Apple.

In an SEC filing Monday, the company wrote, ” In light of the company’s growing number of memberships and revenue from outside the United States, this regional reporting is consistent with how the company reviews and manages its membership and revenue trends.”

Netflix’s letter to shareholders in October regarding third quarter results signaled the plan to begin breaking out the regional numbers. Netflix will report its fourth-quarter and full-year 2019 results on January 21.

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