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  • How to maximize your streaming in October 2023, and why Netflix is all you really need

    How to maximize your streaming in October 2023, and why Netflix is all you really need

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    It’s time to churn, baby, churn.

    The streaming scene has changed significantly over the past year or so, and for the worse: more expensive, less new programming, smaller libraries of older shows. And it’s coming at a time when consumers are being increasingly pressed by higher costs on all fronts. Prices for Disney’s ad-free tiers are rising sharply in October, and Amazon will jack up prices early next year for those who don’t want to see commercials. So it’s time for consumers to once again reassess which services are really worth paying for.

    There are three options if you don’t want your monthly streaming bill to look like your old triple-digit cable bill: bundle (you can save significantly with a Hulu-Disney+ package, for example), move to cheaper plans with commercials (ugh) or just drop the services you watch least. Pick a maximum monthly price ceiling and stick to it — at this point, most people don’t need more than two or three services anyway.

    If you’re frustrated by paying more for less, and want to make a point, cancelling a service is the one way that companies will take notice. Streaming services hate churn (adding and dropping services month-to-month) because it lowers their subscriber base and forces them to raise their marketing costs to win you back. As a consumer, it’s really your only weapon.

    Don’t like how Max keeps removing older shows? Dump it. Finding yourself watching less and less Disney+? Ditch it. It’s satisfying, it’s economical and you can always sign up again in the future.

    One benefit of streaming services is they’re a lot easier to cancel than cable. With prices soaring, now’s the time to be brutal in winnowing your subscriptions. A churn strategy takes some planning, but it pays off. Keep in mind that a billing cycle starts when you sign up, not necessarily at the beginning of the month.

    Each month, this column offers tips on how to maximize your streaming and your budget, rating the major services as a “play,” “pause” or “stop” — similar to investment analysts’ traditional ratings of buy, hold or sell, and picks the best shows to help you make your monthly decisions.

    Here’s a look at what’s coming to the various streaming services in October 2023, and what’s really worth the monthly subscription fee:

    Netflix ($6.99 a month for basic with ads, $15.49 standard with no ads, $19.99 premium with no ads)

    After a ho-hum past few months, Netflix
    NFLX,
    +0.33%
    is rolling out a more robust lineup in October. Which is nice, because no other streaming service is.

    After a two-year layoff, the French heist thriller series “Lupin” (Oct. 5) returns for its third season. Omar Sy stars as a master thief who’s now on the lam, and he carries the show largely on his charisma. It’s a fun one, and a welcome return for viewers.

    But the big-name show of the month is “The Fall of the House of Usher” (Oct. 12), from horror hit-maker Mike Flanagan (“The Haunting of Hill House,” “Midnight Mass”). The miniseries, based on Edgar Allan Poe’s classic story, combines Gothic horror with a modern twist, as the corrupt CEO of a family-owned and scandal-plagued pharmaceutical company is forced to face demons from his past as his family members keep dying, one by one, in increasingly gruesome ways. The sprawling cast includes Bruce Greenwood, Annabeth Gish, Carl Lumbly, Carla Gugino, Rahul Kohli, Mark Hamill, Henry Thomas and Mary McDonnell. This should be one to watch, if for nothing else than to finally see a Sackler-like family get their comeuppance.

    Also on the way: the seventh seasons of the raunchy animated adolescent comedy “Big Mouth” (Oct. 20) and the Spanish high school soap “Elite” (Oct. 20); “Pain Hustlers” (Oct. 27), a meh-looking satirical crime drama starring Emily Blunt and Chris Evans as scheming pharmaceutical reps; and the nature documentary “Life on Our Planet” (Oct. 25), narrated by Morgan Freeman.

    More: What’s new on Netflix in October 2023 — and what’s leaving

    And you may have missed it, but Netflix snuck in a new season of “The Great British Baking Show” at the end of September. New episodes stream every Tuesday, and feature new co-host Alison Hammond, replacing Matt Lucas, who always seemed out of place.

    Who’s Netflix for? Fans of buzz-worthy original shows and movies.

    Play, pause or stop? Play. Between some good-looking new shows, fresh eps of the “Great British Baking Show” and recent additions such as “Sex Education” (though its final season is underwhelming) and HBO’s classic “Band of Brothers,” Netflix is once again a must-have.

    Max ($9.99 a month with ads, or $15.99 with no ads)

    After a dismal September, Max has a better October lineup, with Season 2 of the beloved pirate comedy “Our Flag Means Death” (Oct. 5), starring Rhys Darby and Taika Waititi as wildly different ship captains involved in a star-crossed romance; Season 2 of “The Gilded Age” (Oct. 29), Julian Fellowes’ “Downton Abbey”-esque costume drama set in 1880s New York high society, with a sprawling cast that includes Carrie Coon, Cynthia Nixon, Christine Baranski, Morgan Spector and Louisa Jacobson; and the fourth and final season of the DC superhero dramedy “Doom Patrol” (Oct. 12).

    Notably, Warner Bros. Discovery’s
    WBD,
    +1.59%
    Max is launching its live-sports tier — the unfortunately named Bleacher Report Sports — on Oct. 5, just in time for the MLB playoffs and upcoming NBA season. The add-on tier will be free for all subscribers through February, when its price will shoot up to $9.99 a month.

    Also: What’s new on Max in October 2023 — and what’s leaving

    This is also your last chance to watch a bunch of AMC shows that are getting a two-month promotional run on Max: “Fear the Walking Dead” Seasons 1-7, “Anne Rice’s Interview with the Vampire” Season 1, “Dark Winds” Season 1, “Gangs of London” Seasons 1-2, “Ride with Norman Reedus” Seasons 1-5, “A Discovery of Witches” Seasons 1-3, and “Killing Eve” Seasons 1-4 will all leave Oct. 31. Do yourself a favor and at least watch “Dark Winds.”

    One more hidden gem to discover: Season 3 of the British rom-com “Starstruck,” which landed Sept. 28. It’s utterly charming and unwaveringly romantic, with literal LOL moments and some of the most swoon-worthy banter in recent years. Catch up with all three seasons, it’s an easy binge that’s well worth it.

    Who’s Max for? HBO fans and movie lovers. And now, unscripted TV fans too, with a slew of Discovery shows.

    Play, pause or stop? Pause and think it over. It’s an exceptionally weak month for streamers, but Max’s lineup — especially with the addition of live sports and its deep library — makes it one of the least weakest.

    Amazon’s Prime Video ($14.99 a month, or $8.99 without Prime membership)

    Prime Video has a fine lineup in October. Not great. Not terrible. But very OK.

    “Totally Killer” (Oct. 6) looks to be a cleverer-than-most spin on a horror trope, as Kiernan Shipka (“Mad Men”) stars as a 17-year-old who travels back in time to 1987 to stop a serial killer before he can start a slaying spree that terrorized her mother (Julie Bowen).

    Greg Daniels’ existential comedy “Upload” (Oct. 20) is back for its third season of rom-com exploits in a digital afterlife, thanks to uploaded consciousness. (Disclaimer: I liked Season 1, but can’t for the life of me remember if I ever watched Season 2, which doesn’t bode well, but perfectly fits this month’s “meh it’s OK” theme.)

    Meanwhile, Amazon’s
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    +0.90%
    free, ad-supported channel, Freevee, has the second season of “Bosch: Legacy” (Oct. 20), the “Bosch” spinoff starring Titus Welliver as a private investigator in L.A., while his daughter Maddie (Madison Lintz) charts her own path as a police officer. As gritty detective shows go, it’s solid.

    Prime Video also has a decent lineup of NFL Thursday Night Football; “The Burial” (Oct. 13), a funeral-home drama movie starring Oscar-winners Jamie Foxx and Tommy Lee Jones; all 11 seasons of the classic sitcom “Frasier” (Oct. 1), just in time for the reboot on Paramount+; as well as new eps every week of “The Boys” spinoff “Gen V” and the season finale of “The Wheel of Time” (Oct 6).

    See more: Everything coming to Amazon’s Prime Video and Freevee in October 2023

    It’s also a good time to dig into Prime Video’s extensive library, before commercials come early next year. In an obnoxious move, rather than add an ad-supported tier at a lower price, Amazon will subject all subscribers to commercials — unless they pay an extra $3-a-month ransom. Commercials will be especially annoying on Prime’s more cinematic series, so watch great-looking shows like “I’m a Virgo,” “Dead Ringers” and “The English” interruption-free, while you still can.

    Who’s Prime Video for? Movie lovers, TV-series fans who value quality over quantity.

    Play, pause or stop? Pause. There’s no a compelling reason to start a subscription now, but if you already have one, there’s probably enough to watch.

    Disney+ ($7.99 a month with ads, $13.99 with no ads, starting Oct. 12)

    After a hiatus of more than two years, Marvel’s “Loki” (Oct. 5) is finally back for its second season. The new season finds the eponymous god of mischief (played by Tom Hiddleston) bouncing across the multiverse in a battle for free will while trying to elude agents of the mysterious Time Variant Authority. Season 1 of “Loki” was one of Marvel’s better TV adaptations, and hopes are high that Season 2 can recapture that sense of chaotic fun. Owen Wilson returns as TVA agent Mobius, and Oscar winner Ke Huy Quan (“Everything Everywhere All at Once”) joins the cast, which also features Jonathan Majors as big bad Kang the Conqueror, which is… problematic. Disney is reportedly still planning for Majors to play a key role in “Loki” and the next phase of “Avengers” movies despite his arrest on assault charges earlier this year, which prompted troubling allegations of past physical and emotional abuse toward women. (“Loki” had already finished filming prior to his arrest.)

    Disney also has “Goosebumps” (Oct. 13), about a group of high school friends fighting supernatural forces as they uncover long-buried secrets about their small town in this series adaptation of R.L. Stine’s hugely popular series of spooky novels. (It’ll also stream on Hulu.)

    The “Star Wars” spinoff “Ahsoka” has its season finale Oct. 3, while ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars” will stream every Tuesday.

    Who’s Disney+ for? Families with kids, hardcore “Star Wars” and Marvel fans. For people not in those groups, Disney’s
    DIS,
    +1.15%
     library can be lacking.

    Play, pause or stop? Pause. The price of ad-free Disney+ jumps by $3 a month starting Oct. 12 — how much do you or your family really want to watch “Loki” and “Goosebumps”? It’ll be worth it for some, but an opportune time to cancel for others.

    Hulu ($7.99 a month with ads, or $17.99 with no ads, starting Oct. 12)

    Hulu has been on a fantastic run since the start of summer, but all good things must end. And it happens to coincide with a $3-a-month hike to its ad-free subscription.

    October’s lineup is weak, and heavily weighed toward Halloween-themed fare, such as Season 2 of FX’s spinoff anthology “American Horror Stories” (Oct. 26); the Stephen King thrillers “Rose Red” (Oct. 1) and “The Boogeyman” (Oct. 5); the Starz horror series “Ash vs. Evil Dead” (Oct. 1); the body-horror movie “Appendage” (Oct. 2); and “Goosebumps” (Oct. 13), a live-action adaptation of R.L. Stine’s bestselling kids’ book series (which will also stream on Disney+).

    Non-horror shows include new seasons of Fox’s “The Simpsons,” “Family Guy” and “Bob’s Burgers” (all Oct. 2), and Season 2 of the comedy “Shorsey” (Oct. 27), the “Letterkenny” spinoff series about minor-league hockey that has a surprising amount of heart to go with its absolutely filthy dialogue.

    For more: What’s coming to Hulu in October 2023 — and what’s leaving

    As an added bonus, all five seasons of ABC’s 1980s detective-agency rom-com “Moonlighting” (Oct. 10), starring Bruce Willis and Cybill Shepherd, will stream for the first time ever (legally at least). If I remember correctly, there were some really high highs but also some really low lows — but it’ll be worth checking out, for nostalgia if nothing else.

    There are also new eps every week of “The Golden Bachelor” and “Bachelor in Paradise,” the season finale of “Only Murders in the Building” (Oct. 3) and the series finale of “Archer” (Oct. 11). And if you missed it, all three seasons of “Reservation Dogs” are there and just begging to be watched, or rewatched. (It’s about as perfect as a TV series could ever be, and the recently concluded Season 3 is the best thing I’ve seen this year.)

    Who’s Hulu for? TV lovers. There’s a deep library for those who want older TV series and next-day streaming of many current network and cable shows.

    Play, pause or stop? Stop. If you’re on the ad tier, this month might be tolerable, but it’s certainly not worth $17.99.

    Paramount+ ($5.99 a month with ads, $11.99 a month with Showtime and no ads)

    Twenty years after ending its 11-season run (with 37 Emmy wins), the classic sitcom “Frasier” (Oct. 12) is back. Sort of. Kelsey Grammar returns in this revival as the pompous Dr. Frasier Crane, who’s moved back to Boston to be closer to his adult son (played by Jack Cutmore-Scott), who doesn’t necessarily want him there. The cast is mostly new, though Bebe Neuwirth (as Frasier’s ex-wife Lilith) and Peri Gilpin (his radio producer Roz) will reportedly guest star. David Hyde Pierce (Niles) and Jane Leeves (Daphne) will not return, however, which is a bummer since that’s where much of the original show’s laughs came from (John Mahoney, who played Frasier’s father Marty Crane, died in 2018). The jury’s out on this one — while in theory, it could be a refreshing update to a nostalgic favorite, the trailer is not encouraging.

    Paramount+ also has “Pet Sematary: Bloodlines” (Oct. 6), a creepy prequel to the 2019 horror reboot; “Fellow Travelers” (Oct. 27), a decades-spanning queer love story starring Matt Bomer and Jonathan Bailey; and Showtime’s courtroom drama “The Caine Mutiny Court-Martial” (Oct. 6), the late director William Friedkin’s last film, starring Keifer Sutherland, the late Lance Reddick and Jake Lacy.

    That’s on top of a live-sports lineup that includes SEC and Big Ten college football on Saturdays, NFL football every Sunday and UEFA Champions League soccer matches.

    Who’s Paramount+ for? Gen X cord-cutters who miss live sports and familiar Paramount Global
    PARA,
    +0.62%
     broadcast and cable shows.

    Play, pause or stop? Stop. There’s a good football lineup, at least.

    Apple TV+ ($6.99 a month)

    It’s another slow month for Apple
    AAPL,
    +0.30%    ,
    highlighted by the miniseries “Lessons in Chemistry” (Oct. 13), based on Bonnie Garmus’ bestselling novel. Brie Larson stars as a woman in the 1950s whose dreams of becoming a scientist are scuttled by male chauvinism, and instead becomes the host of a TV cooking show, where she inspires housewives and fights the patriarchy. Apple is getting a reputation for getting big-name stars for prestige-type series, only for the shows to fizzle out and quickly be forgotten (like “Mosquito Coast,” “Hello Tomorrow” and “Dear Edward,” for starters). I have yet to see any marketing for this series, and it would not be a surprise for someone to ask six months from now: “Wait, Brie Larson was in an Apple show?”

    There’s also a new documentary from Errol Morris, “The Pigeon Tunnel” (Oct. 20), about the life of spy-turned-writer David Cornwell, aka John le Carré; and “The Enfield Poltergeist” (Oct. 27), a four-part docuseries about the supposed real-life haunting that inspired “The Conjuring 2.”

    Apple’s biggest title will be on Oct. 20 in movie theaters, with the wide release of Martin Scorsese’s “Killers of the Flower Moon,” the spectacular-looking historical drama about a series of mysterious killings of Osage tribal members in Oklahoma in the 1920s, starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Lily Gladstone and Robert De Niro. There’s no streaming release date yet, but expect it to land on Apple TV+ after its theatrical run, possibly in November but more likely in December.

    There are also new episodes every week of “The Morning Show,” “The Changeling” (season finale Oct. 13) and “Invasion” (season finale Oct. 25).

    Who’s Apple TV+ for? It offers a little something for everyone, but not necessarily enough for anyone — although it’s getting there.

    Play, pause or stop? Stop. Apple’s had a great year, but there’s just not a lot on right now. But there’s good stuff coming in November (Season 4 of “For All Mankind”) and December (Season 3 of “Slow Horses”).

    Remember, you can get three free months of Apple TV+ if you buy a new iPhone, iPad or Mac. Strategically, if you buy an iPhone 15, and wait a bit to redeem the free trial, you’ll want it to extend into January.

    Peacock (Premium for $5.99 a month with ads, or $11.99 a month with no ads)

    It’s all about horror and sports for Peacock this October.

    On the scary side, there’s Season 2 of the werewolf rom-com “Wolf Like Me” (Oct. 19), starring Josh Gad and Isla Fisher; “Five Nights at Freddy’s” (Oct. 27), a horror movie based on the videogame about a troubled security guard who starts working the night shift at a cursed pizza parlor, starring Josh Hutcherson and Matthew Lillard; and the true-crime anthology “John Carpenter’s Suburban Screams” (Oct. 13).

    On the sports side, Peacock has the Rugby World Cup (through Oct. 28), NFL Sunday Night Football, Big Ten and Notre Dame college football, English Premier League soccer, and a full slate of golf, motorsports and horse racing.

    Meanwhile, the “John Wick” prequel miniseries “The Continental” ends Oct. 6.

    Who’s Peacock for? Live sports and next-day shows from Comcast’s
    CMCSA,
    -1.16%
     NBCUniversal are the main draw, but there’s a good library of shows and movies.

    Play, pause or stop? Stop. The live-sports offerings are the only lure.

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  • Hollywood writers strike declared over after boards approve new contract with studios

    Hollywood writers strike declared over after boards approve new contract with studios

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    LOS ANGELES — Leaders of the screenwriters union declared their nearly five-month-old strike over Tuesday after board members approved a contract agreement with studios, bringing Hollywood at least partly back from a historic halt in production.

    The governing boards of the eastern and western branches of the Writers Guild of America and their joint negotiating committee all voted to accept the deal, two days after the tentative agreement was reached with a coalition of Hollywood’s biggest studios, streaming services and production companies. After the vote they declared that the strike would be over and writers would be free to start on scripts at 12:01 a.m. Wednesday.

    Late-night talk shows — the first to go dark when writers walked out on May 2 — are likely the first shows that will resume. Scripted shows will take longer to return, with actors still on strike and no negotiations yet on the horizon.

    The writers still have to vote to ratify the contract themselves in early October, but lifting the strike will allow them to work during that process, the guild told members in an email.

    After Tuesday’s board votes, the contracts were released for the first time to the writers, who had not yet been given any details on the deal, which their leaders called “exceptional.”

    The three-year agreement includes significant wins in the main areas writers had fought for — compensation, length of employment, size of staffs and control of artificial intelligence — matching or nearly equaling what they had sought at the outset of the strike.

    The union had sought minimum increases in pay and future residual earnings from shows of between 5% and 6%, depending on the position of the writer. The studios had wanted between 2% and 4%. The compromise deal was a raise of between 3.5% and 5%.

    The guild also negotiated new residual payments based on the popularity of streaming shows, where writers will get bonuses for being a part of the most popular shows on Netflix
    NFLX,
    -1.44%    ,
    Max and other services, a proposal studios initially rejected. Many writers on picket lines had complained that they weren’t properly paid for helping create heavily watched properties.

    The writers also got the requirement they sought that shows intended to run at least 13 episodes will have at least six writers on staff, with the numbers shifting based on the number of episodes. They did not get their desire for guaranteed staffs of six on shows that had not yet been ordered to series, settling instead for a guaranteed three.

    Writers also got a guarantee that staffs on shows in initial development will be employed for at least 10 weeks, and that staffs on shows that go to air will be employed for three weeks per episode.

    On artificial intelligence, the writers got the regulation and control of the emerging technology they had sought. Under the contract, raw, AI-generated storylines will not be regarded as “literary material” — a term in their contracts for scripts and other story forms a screenwriter produces. This means they won’t be competing with computers for screen credits. Nor will AI-generated stories be considered “source” material, their contractual language for the novels, video games or other works that writers may adapt into scripts.

    Writers have the right under the deal to use AI in their process if the company they are working for agrees and other conditions are met. But companies cannot require a writer to use AI.

    Still-striking members of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists returned to the picket lines earlier Tuesday for the first time since the writers struck their tentative deal, and they were animated by a new spirit of optimism.

    “For a hot second, I really thought that this was going to go on until next year,” said Marissa Cuevas, an actor who has appeared on the TV series “Kung Fu” and “The Big Bang Theory.” “Knowing that at least one of us has gotten a good deal gives a lot of hope that we will also get a good deal.”

    Writers’ picket lines had been suspended, but they were encouraged to walk in solidarity with actors, and many were on the lines Tuesday, including “Mad Men” creator Matthew Weiner, who picketed alongside friend and “ER” actor Noah Wyle as he has throughout the strikes.

    “We would never have had the leverage we had if SAG had not gone out,” Weiner said. “They were very brave to do it.”

    The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which represents the studios in negotiations, chose to deal with the longer-striking writers first, and leaders of SAG-AFTRA said they had received no overtures on resuming talks. That’s likely to change soon.

    Actors also voted to authorize their leadership to potentially expand their walkout to  include the lucrative videogame market, a step that could put new pressure on Hollywood studios to make a deal with the performers who provide voices and stunts for games.

    The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Radio and Television Artists announced the move late Monday, saying that 98% of its members voted to go on strike against videogame companies if ongoing negotiations are not successful. The announcement came ahead of more talks planned for Tuesday.

    Acting in videogames can include a variety of roles, from voice performances to motion capture work as well as stunts. Video game actors went on strike in 2016 in a work stoppage that lasted nearly a year.

    Some of the same issues are at play in the video game negotiations as in the broader actors strike that has shut down Hollywood for months, including wages, safety measures and protections on the use of artificial intelligence. The companies involved include gaming giants Activision Blizzard
    ATVI,
    -0.05%    ,
    Electronic Arts
    EA,
    -1.13%    ,
    Epic Games, Take 2 Productions
    TTWO,
    -0.99%
    as well as Disney
    DIS,
    -1.19%
    and Warner Bros.′
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    +0.28%
    videogame divisions.

    “It’s time for the videogame companies to stop playing games and get serious about reaching an agreement on this contract,” SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher said in a statement.

    Audrey Cooling, a spokesperson for videogame producers, said they are “continuing to negotiate in good faith” and have reached tentative agreements on more than half of the proposals on the table.

    So far this year, U.S. consumers have spent $34.9 billion on videogames, consoles and accessories, according to market research group Circana.

    The threat of a videogame strike emerged as Hollywood writers were on the verge of getting back to work after months on the picket lines.

    The alliance of studios, streaming services and producers has chosen to negotiate only with the writers so far, and has made no overtures yet toward restarting talks with SAG-AFTRA. That will presumably change soon.

    SAG-AFTRA leaders have said they will look closely at the writers’ agreement, which includes many of the same issues, but it will not effect their demands.

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  • These 20 growth stocks are worth considering on a pullback, says Citi

    These 20 growth stocks are worth considering on a pullback, says Citi

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    Citi has released a list of 20 large-cap growth stocks that it says present opportunities in the event of a pullback.

    “Our call since early summer has been to hold Growth and look to buy on pullbacks,” Citi analyst Scott Chronert said in a note released Monday, adding that Citi has had a tactical preference for cyclicals. “However, on the heels of the strong Cyclicals surge during June and July, and our upwardly revised S&P 500 target of 4600, the messaging has been to buy on pullbacks more broadly,” he wrote.

    Citi also notes that the Russell 1000 Growth Index
    RLG
    has sold off more than 6% from its mid-July high, although two-thirds of the stocks in the index are down 10% or more, with one-third down more than 20%. “This sets up for interesting intermediate to long-term stock selection opportunities,” Chronert said.

    Related: Preorders for the iPhone 15 have begun, and here’s a sign they’ve been ‘solid’

    The analyst acknowledged that there is still a risk of economic softening ahead, if not a recession. “Yet, the argument that Growth stocks can show fundamental resilience during periods of broader economic weakening is a theme that we have considered for several years now,” he said.

    Set against this backdrop, the analyst firm has compiled a tech-heavy list of 20 stocks that have a buy rating from Citi, have at least 75% of market cap assigned to growth, according to Russell, and have experienced a decline of 10% or more from year-to-date highs since March 31. Other common characteristics of the stocks include consensus estimates of free cash flow per share above March 31 levels and free cash flow per share within or above market-implied five-year-forward estimates.

    Tech heavyweights Apple Inc.
    AAPL,
    +0.74%
    and NVIDIA Corp.
    NVDA,
    +1.47%
    are on the list, along with Pinterest Inc.
    PINS,
    -2.47%    ,
    Lam Research Corp.
    LRCX,
    +0.24%    ,
    Teradata Corp.
    TDC,
    +0.36%    ,
    Datadog Inc.
    DDOG,
    +0.09%    ,
    MongoDB Inc.
    MDB,
    -0.73%    ,
    HubSpot Inc.
    HUBS,
    +0.18%
    and KLA Corp.
    KLAC,
    +0.79%    .
    The other stocks cited by Citi are Lockheed Martin Corp.
    LMT,
    -0.18%    ,
    DraftKings Inc.
    DKNG,
    -1.44%    ,
    Las Vegas Sands Corp.
    LVS,
    -0.98%    ,
    Chipotle Mexican Grill Inc.
    CMG,
    -0.85%    ,
    Netflix Inc.
    NFLX,
    +1.31%    ,
    TKO Group Holdings Inc.
    TKO,
    -1.93%    ,
    Rockwell Automation Inc.
    ROK,
    +1.09%
    and Paycom Software Inc.
    PAYC,
    +0.45%    ,
    and healthcare stocks Bruker Corp.
    BRKR,
    +1.04%    ,
    Insulet Corp.
    PODD,
    -0.66%
    and Intuitive Surgical Inc.
    ISRG,
    +1.75%    .

    Related: Will Nvidia stock be like Apple or Cisco in the AI era?

    Shares of Apple, which recently launched its iPhone 15, are down 5.5% in the last three months. Shares of chip maker NVIDIA are up 2.8% over the same period, while Lockheed Martin is down 8.9% and DraftKings is up 8.6%. Las Vegas Sands is down 21.8% and Chipotle is down 8.8%, while Netflix is down 7.8%.

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  • Amazon is bringing ads to Prime Video — the ad-free option will cost an extra $2.99 a month

    Amazon is bringing ads to Prime Video — the ad-free option will cost an extra $2.99 a month

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    Rafael Henrique | Lightrocket | Getty Images

    Ads are coming to Amazon‘s Prime Video.

    The company announced Friday that its streaming service — a part of Prime subscriptions that cost $14.99 a month — will now have limited ads in its TV series and movies.

    Advertising on Prime Video, known for shows such as “The Boys” and “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” will roll out in the U.S. and other cities in early 2024, with other countries to follow later in the year. If U.S. customers don’t want commercials, they will have to pay an additional $2.99 a month. Live events and sports will continue to feature ads in this tier, the company said in its announcement.

    Prime customers will get an email in the weeks leading up to the advertising rollout, which will include the option to sign up for the ad-free tier.

    “To continue investing in compelling content and keep increasing that investment over a long period of time, starting in early 2024, Prime Video shows and movies will include limited advertisements,” the company said in a post Friday.

    Amazon said it plans to have “meaningfully fewer ads than linear TV and other streaming providers.”

    Prime Video will now join rival streaming services, including Netflix, Warner Bros. Discovery‘s Max and Disney‘s Hulu and Disney+, that are leaning on advertising. The ad-supported options are not only giving consumers a cheaper option as the list of streaming apps grows, but are also bringing in an additional revenue source.

    Media companies in particular have been trying a variety of ways to make the streaming business profitable, from advertising to password-sharing crackdowns to cost cutting.

    Streaming behemoth Netflix switched gears late last year and began offering a cheaper, ad-supported plan. Netflix was slow to embrace advertising, but as subscriber growth slowed, the company instituted the option in an effort to boost revenue.

    The company recently removed its cheapest, ad-free plan in a push to get more sign-ups for its ad option. Company executives have said the economics of its ad plan were higher than the basic plan, and that advertising is incremental to Netflix’s revenue and profit.

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  • Hollywood writers reportedly near deal with studios to end strike

    Hollywood writers reportedly near deal with studios to end strike

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    Hollywood writers and studios are reportedly near an agreement to end one of the months-long strikes that have brought production of TV shows and movies to a halt.

    Citing sources close to the negotiations, CNBC reported Wednesday night that the two sides were close to a deal following a face-to-face meeting earlier in the day. The sides are reportedly optimistic that an agreement can be finalized Thursday. However, the report also said the strike could drag on through the end of the year if a deal is not reached.

    Separately,…

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  • Hollywood is paying a steep price for never really figuring out the streaming model

    Hollywood is paying a steep price for never really figuring out the streaming model

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    People carry signs as SAG-AFTRA members walk the picket line in solidarity with striking WGA workers outside Netflix offices in Los Angeles, July 11, 2023.

    Mario Tama | Getty Images News | Getty Images

    Picket signs have lined the gates of Hollywood’s studios for nearly five months, as the industry’s writers and actors rally for AI protections, better wages and a cut of streaming profits.

    The problem is streaming isn’t yet profitable for many studios.

    Sparked by the creation of Netflix’s direct-to-consumer platform in 2007, streaming has upended the economics of the media industry. Yet, it’s still unclear whether it’s a sustainable business model for the future.

    “Without sounding hyperbolic, the change in the economics of the North American media industry in the last five years has been breathtaking,” said Steven Schiffman, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University.

    Legacy media companies like Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, Paramount and NBCUniversal scrambled to compete with Netflix when it began creating original content in 2013 and slowly pulled market share over the next five years. The studios padded their platforms with massive content libraries and the promise of new original shows and films for consumers.

    However, the subscription-based streaming model proves vastly different than the ad-revenue-fueled traditional TV bundle. High licensing costs and low revenues per subscriber quickly caught up with studios, which had previously placated shareholders with massive subscription growth.

    Netflix was the first streamer to report a loss in subscribers in 2022, sending its stock and other media companies spiraling. Disney has followed suit. Since then, both have set subscription numbers aside in favor of advertising, a password-sharing crackdown and raising prices.

    Media companies also have begun slashing content spending budgets. Disney CEO Bob Iger has promised the company will focus on quality over quantity when it comes to both its streaming and theatrical businesses, pointing to Marvel as an example of too much content.

    Yet streaming remains the focus for all of these companies as consumers rapidly cut the cord and opt for streaming. To make up for the losses, media organizations are now relying on methods that once made the traditional bundle so successful.

    “What’s the fundamental solution? In some way, shape or form, it’s everything brought together,” said CEO Ken Solomon of the Tennis Channel, owned by Sinclair, of the various business models in media. “It’s about understanding where to put a little more resources and how they all are glued together to satisfy the consumer.”

    A broken model

    Two strategies media companies long relied upon — windowing content to various platforms and creating more cable channels to reap higher fees from the bundle — proved lucrative and still reap profits.

    “This gun has been cocking itself for decades,” said Solomon, noting that the pay TV bundle was a good value proposition until it became too expensive for consumers. That gave Netflix an opening to upend how the entertainment industry makes and spends money.

    Legacy media companies scrambled to follow suit, unsure if the model actually worked. But they were desperate to keep up with changing consumer demand, and in the process they depleted other revenue streams.

    Now turmoil rules the industry. Companies like Disney and Warner Bros. Discovery are in the midst of reorganizations — slashing jobs and content costs while trying various ways to piece together profits.

    An image from Netflix’s “Stranger Things.”

    Source: Netflix

    “All of these companies spent more money than they likely should have,” said Marc DeBevoise, CEO and board director of Brightcove, a streaming technology company.

    Netflix, with a considerable head start, is the only company to make a profit off of streaming. “For everyone else, it’s still dictated by linear TV,” said UBS analyst John Hodulik. “That’s a problem as the decline in customers accelerates and streaming is not a big enough opportunity to offset that.”

    Although subscriber growth initially ramped up streaming subscriber growth and bolstered many media stocks, it was short-lived. Fears of a recession, inflation and rising interest rates led Wall Street to reassess these companies and focus on profitability as subscriber growth slowed.

    A content arms race

    Netflix’s entrance into media signaled the beginning of a content arms race that, ultimately, hasn’t paid off for any media company.

    Content spending ballooned across the industry, with each company spending tens of billions of dollars for new shows and films in an effort to lure in new subscribers — and keep the ones they already had.

    “The networks had aligned with their streaming services and taken all the elasticity out of it. They were throwing money at a problem and hoping that it was going to solve itself,” said Solomon. “There was no economics behind it.”

    Race to launch

    • Netflix — launched streaming service in January 2007, first original content launched February 2013
    • Hulu — launched streaming service in March 2008
    • Paramount+ — launched as CBS All Access in October 2014, rebranded as Paramount+ in March 2021
    • Disney+ — launched streaming service in November 2019
    • Peacock — launched streaming service in April 2020
    • Max — launched as HBO Max in May 2020, rebranded as Max in May 2023

    There were also massive one-off licensing deals for shows like “The Office,” “Friends” and “Seinfeld,” which viewers were actively watching on repeat.

    Studios even struck exclusive contracts with some of Hollywood’s biggest writer-producers — Ryan Murphy, Shonda Rhimes, J.J. Abrams, Kenya Barris and the duo of David Benioff and D.B. Weiss — in the hope that they could create new projects that could capture the attention of audiences.

    Show budgets draw a lot of attention these days. But Jonathan Miller, a former Hulu board member and current CEO of Integrated Media, doesn’t recall that being a focus when it was just the four major broadcast networks creating all of the content.

    DeBevoise, a former ViacomCBS (now Paramount) executive, said he doesn’t remember greenlighting a show, including “Star Trek Discovery,” in the mid-2010s at CBS for more than $10 million an episode, noting many were “much, much less expensive.”

    Meanwhile, Solomon, who once ran Universal Studios Television, recalled when his budgets for top TV shows like “Law & Order” were below $2 million an episode. “I thought budgets were out of control back then,” he said.

    Shonda Rhimes attends 2018 Vanity Fair Oscar Party on March 4, 2018 in Beverly Hills, CA. 

    Presley Ann | Patrick McMullan | Getty Images

    Disney sought to capitalize on the success of its Marvel Cinematic Universe by developing more than a dozen superhero shows for its Disney+ platform. Although the seasons were shortened, often only six to 10 episodes, each episode cost around $25 million. Similar production budgets were seen for the company’s foray into the new live-action Star Wars TV series.

    Netflix has poured money into multiple seasons of political drama “The Crown,” science fiction darling “Stranger Things” and a series based on The Witcher video game franchise. Production costs per episode for these series ranged from $11 million to $30 million.

    And Warner Bros. Discovery is adding more Game of Thrones series to its catalog of direct-to-consumer offerings with “House of the Dragon,” which cost around $20 million per episode, and the upcoming “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight,” which has not begun filming.

    Meanwhile, e-commerce giant Amazon shelled out a record $465 million on its first season of a Lord of the Rings prequel series, which was met with tepid responses from critics and fans alike.

    “The price of content isn’t always determinant of success. ‘The Simpsons’ were crudely animated initially, right? So, it’s not necessarily that if you go spend a lot of money, it works,” Solomon said.

    Bart Simpson plays esports in an episode of “The Simpsons” that aired on March 17, 2019.

    Fox

    At the same time the economics for actors, writers and the industry as a whole changed.

    “The problem is that the cost increases don’t make sense given the revenue models. Something got broken in this part of the business if that kind of increase happened and actors and writers don’t feel like they got their fair share,” DeBevoise said.

    A growing disconnect

    While many of Hollywood’s biggest studios are publicly traded and must share quarterly financial reports, there are no rules about providing streaming-viewership data. This lack of transparency has made recent contract negotiations between studios and the industry’s writers and actors especially contentious.

    “There’s a frustration about how these people can get together and share this information and come up with something that is reasonable for both sides,” said Schiffman, the Georgetown professor. “But until that happens, in my view, this thing goes on until next year.”

    Streaming studios, in particular, have long been reluctant to share data around viewership and don’t want compensation to be tied to the popularity of shows, including those that have been licensed from other studios.

    This is in stark contrast to how linear television has handled popular shows. Traditionally, studios pay residuals, long-term payments, to those who worked on film and television shows after their initial release. Actors and writers get paid every time an episode or film runs on broadcast or cable television or when someone buys a DVD or Blu-ray Disc.

    When it comes to streaming, there are no residual payments. Studios that get a licensing fee pass on a small sum to actors and writers, but no additional compensation is given if the show performs well on the platform. Actors, in particular, are looking to change this.

    “Why I think the streaming model has been a difficult model for the actors and writers, and I was part of helping that model, is that there was a fundamental shift of long-term versus short-term economics that likely wasn’t properly understood or explained,” said DeBevoise.

    Back to the future

    Media companies’ effort to make streaming profitable is drawing out many of the old business models that were successful in the past.

    The subscription streaming model is being subsidized now by tried and true models like advertising, licensing content to other platforms, cracking down on password sharing, and windowing content to different platforms with longer stretches of time in between.

    “Netflix understood finally, because of the Street, that subscriber numbers don’t mean jack, if the economics don’t pencil out,” said Peter Csathy, founder and chair of advisory firm Creative Media.

    Even the pay TV bundle, despite rampant cord cutting by consumers, remains a reliable source of revenue.

    The recent dispute between Charter Communications and Disney highlighted this fact, and led to Disney+ and ESPN+ being bundled with some pay TV subscriptions.

    The consumer is ultimately the winner in the Disney-Charter deal, says media mogul Tom Rogers

    “We, the distributors, are funding the streaming experience. And it’s frankly a better content experience on streaming than what is provided to us on linear TV,” said Rob Thun, chief content officer at DirecTV. “These companies will cease to exist without the funding of distributors’ licensing fees. Perhaps this is a moment of awakening.”

    Disney and even Netflix, which long resisted ads, are among the companies relying more on ad-supported offerings to boost subscriber growth and bring in another revenue stream, even as the ad market has been soft.

    This is especially true as free, ad-supported streaming services like Fox Corp.’s Tubi and Paramount’s Pluto — which are likened to broadcast networks — have also exploded. Besides the parent companies leaning on the ad revenue from these platforms, other media companies, like Warner Bros. Discovery, are funneling content there for licensing fees.

    “In terms of the business models, they all ‘work,’” said DeBevoise. He noted paid tiers for the more expensive, timely content will remain, while free and options with commercials will support the older library shows and movie. “There are going to be hybrid models that reincarnate the dual-revenue cable TV model with both a subscription fee and ads. It’s all going to be about price-to-value and time-to-value for the consumer.”

    Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal and CNBC.

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  • What’s worth streaming in September 2023? Here are your best bets amid slim pickings.

    What’s worth streaming in September 2023? Here are your best bets amid slim pickings.

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    Looking to spend your entertainment dollars wisely in September? Watch Hulu and read a book or two.

    That pretty much sums up a hugely underwhelming lineup from streaming services, which burned through their best shows in the spring and have little to offer for the start of the traditional fall TV season. That’s not to say there aren’t a handful of promising shows — there are — but is one decent new show per service worth the price of multiple monthly subscriptions? Almost certainly not.

    It’s…

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  • Disney looking to crack down on password sharing, following Netflix’s lead

    Disney looking to crack down on password sharing, following Netflix’s lead

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    ““We are actively exploring ways to address account sharing and the best options for paying subscribers to share their accounts with friends and family.””


    — Disney CEO Bob Iger

    Pour another one out for streaming freeloaders.

    Netflix Inc.
    NFLX,
    -2.14%
    has been cracking down on account-sharing, and now Walt Disney Co.
    DIS,
    -0.73%
    is likely to follow suit.

    Bob Iger, the media giant’s chief executive, said Wednesday that the company was “actively exploring” how to tackle the fact that many streaming subscribers on Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+ share passwords and accounts with loved ones.

    “Later this year, we will begin to update our subscriber agreements with additional terms on our sharing policies, and we will roll out tactics to drive monetization sometime in 2024,” he said, according to a transcript provided by AlphaSense/Sentieo.

    See also: Disney posts smaller streaming loss, will hike prices for Disney+ and Hulu

    Whereas Netflix suggested that it could be housing 100 million global account borrowers, Iger declined to put a number on Disney’s own base of password sharers, “except to say that it’s significant.”

    “What we don’t know, of course, is as we get to work on this, how much of the password-sharing, as we basically eliminate it, will convert to growth” in subscribers, he said. “Obviously, we believe there will be some, but we’re not speculating.”

    Read: The long-simmering rumor of Apple buying Disney is resurfacing as Bob Iger looks to sell assets

    The company plans to “get at this issue” next calendar year, and the initiative could have some impact on Disney’s business in that period.

    “It’s possible that we won’t be complete or the work will not be completed within the calendar year, but we certainly have established this as a real priority, and we actually think that there’s an opportunity here to help us grow our business,” Iger continued.

    Disney is making a big push to improve the financials of its streaming business, after spending the stay-home pandemic era focused on raw subscriber growth. Now the company is targeting streaming profitability by the end of fiscal 2024, and it just announced a new round of price hikes in pursuit of that goal.

    Don’t miss: Disney is raising prices on Hulu and Disney+ again. Here’s how much you’ll soon pay.

    “We grew this business really fast, really before we even understood what our pricing strategy should be or could be,” Iger commented. In the past six months, the company has started to pursue a pricing strategy “that’s really aimed at enabling us to improve the bottom line, ultimately to turn this into a growth business.”

    Netflix is farther along in its efforts, and it’s won praise from Wall Street for them. Executives at the streaming giant indicated early success with Netflix’s broad password-sharing crackdown, though it will take time for the impact to fully manifest in the company’s financials.

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  • Baird says Netflix shares can once again trade at $500

    Baird says Netflix shares can once again trade at $500

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  • Dow posts longest winning streak in nearly 6 years; Nasdaq slumps over 2%

    Dow posts longest winning streak in nearly 6 years; Nasdaq slumps over 2%

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    U.S. stocks finished mostly lower Thursday, with the Nasdaq and S&P 500 dragged down by disappointing earnings, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose for a ninth straight day for its longest winning streak in nearly six years.

    How stocks traded

    • The S&P 500
      SPX,
      -0.68%
      fell 30.85 points, or 0.7%, to close at 4,534.87.

    • The Dow
      DJIA,
      +0.47%
      rose 163.97 points, or 0.5%, to finish at 35,225.18. The winning streak is its longest since a nine-day run that ended on Sept. 20, 2017, according to Dow Jones Market Data.

    • The Nasdaq Composite
      COMP,
      -2.05%
      ended at 14,063.31, down 294.71 points, or 2.1%.

    What drove markets

    After lagging behind the S&P 500 and Nasdaq for most of the year, the Dow Jones Industrial Average has climbed over the past two weeks. The blue-chip gauge is now heading for its longest streak of daily gains since Sept. 20, 2017, according to Dow Jones Market Data.

    It’s the latest milestone as value stocks and other lagging sectors of the market appear to be playing “catch up,” said Paul Nolte, senior wealth adviser and market strategist at Murphy & Sylvest Wealth Management, during a phone interview with MarketWatch. Although the Dow’s year-to-date gains are still well behind those of the S&P 500, with the blue-chip gauge up 6.6% since Jan. 1, FactSet data show.

    On Wednesday, the S&P 500 and Nasdaq closed at their highest levels in nearly 16 months.

    “We’re finally seeing the rotation to value,” he said. “The Dow is playing catch up with the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq.”

    See: Stock-market bubble trouble? Check out the 3-year view on Nasdaq, S&P 500 returns.

    Technology stocks were lagging following earnings from Netflix Inc.
    NFLX,
    -8.41%
    released late Wednesday, which showed that revenue fell short. Shares fell 8.4%.

    Tesla Inc.
    TSLA,
    -9.74%
    shares fell 9.7% after the electric vehicle maker beat Wall Street expectations for its second quarter but not in the blowout fashion that some market observers were expecting.

    “Netflix missed sales estimates and issued lower-than-expected Q3 guidance, while Tesla’s results showed shrinking profitability with squeeze on margins,” said Henry Allen, strategist at Deutsche Bank.

    Semiconductor shares also took it on the chin, with the PHLX Semiconductor Index
    SOX,
    -3.62%
    falling 3.6%. The drop came after Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. 
    TSM,
    -5.05%
    topped second-quarter earnings expectations but reported margins that contracted, while providing a somewhat downbeat outlook.

    Meanwhile, shares of IBM Corp.
    IBM,
    +2.14%
    and Johnson & Johnson
    JNJ,
    +6.07%
    drove the Dow higher after both companies beat earnings expectations.

    Bad news for Netflix seemed to infect other megacap technology names, as Alphabet Inc. Class A
    GOOGL,
    -2.32%
    and Alphabet Inc.
    GOOG,
    -2.65%
    retreated, as did shares of Apple Inc.
    AAPL,
    -1.01%
    and Microsoft Corp.
    MSFT,
    -2.31%
    after the latter hit a record this week.

    Investors also digested earnings from American Airlines Group Inc.
    AAL,
    -6.24%
    and Blackstone Inc.
    BX,
    -0.61%
    which reported before the opening bell. After the close, investors will hear from Capital One Financial Corp.
    COF,
    -2.52%    ,
    CSX Corp.
    CSX,
    -0.27%
    and First Financial Bancorp
    FFBC,
    -0.54%    ,
    along with a few others.

    In U.S. economic data, weekly jobless benefit claims data showed the number of Americans applying for first-time unemployment benefits fell to a two-month low. Meanwhile, the Philadelphia Fed’s gauge of manufacturing activity came in at negative 13.5 in July, up from 13.7 during the prior month.

    Existing home sales fell in June, while leading index of economic indicators dropped 0.7% in June, falling for the 15th month in a row.

    Companies in focus

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  • CNBC Daily Open: Markets care more about expectations than numbers

    CNBC Daily Open: Markets care more about expectations than numbers

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    Goldman Sachs headquarters in New York, US, on Thursday, July 6, 2023.

    Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | Getty Images

    This report is from today’s CNBC Daily Open, our new, international markets newsletter. CNBC Daily Open brings investors up to speed on everything they need to know, no matter where they are. Like what you see? You can subscribe here.

    What you need to know today

    Cautious rise
    U.S. stocks     edged up slightly Wednesday as traders digested earnings reports, with Tesla, Netflix and IBM reporting after the bell. Asia-Pacific markets traded mixed Thursday. China’s Shanghai Composite fell 0.33% as the country’s central bank left its one- and five-year loan prime rates unchanged. But Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index managed to add 0.26%, reversing two straight days of losses.

    Tesla’s record revenue
    Tesla booked record revenue of $24.93 billion, a year-on-year increase of 42% thanks to price cuts. However, that meant operating margin dropped to 9.6%, the lowest for the last five quarters. Still, net income increased 20% from last year to $2.7 billion. Both profit and revenue beat Wall Street’s expectations. But shares sank 4.19% in extended trading after CEO Elon Musk failed to give concrete information on Cybertruck and robotaxi plans during Tesla’s earnings call.

    Netflix’s crackdown worked
    Netflix’s second-quarter revenue rose 3% to $8.19 billion from a year earlier and net income increased 3.47% to $1.49 billion. Subscribers jumped 5.9 million last quarter as Netflix stopped password sharing. Netflix also removed its cheapest ad-free plan in the U.S. and U.K. Its shares plunged 8.26% in after-hours trading, but that’s a sign investors are selling shares to lock in profits, CNBC’s Alex Sherman wrote.

    Not all that is Goldman glitters
    Goldman Sachs’ profit fell 58% to $1.22 billion, or $3.08 a share, missing estimates. Goldman’s decline in trading and losses related to GreenSky sapped around $3.95 from per share earnings. Revenue fell 8% to $10.9 billion, marginally beating expectations.

    [PRO] Conviction over Chinese AI firms
    Investor excitement over generative artificial intelligence isn’t limited to the U.S. technology companies. Goldman Sachs just named its top picks of Chinese firms that are likely to benefit from AI — two are on its conviction list, meaning that the bank expects them to have the biggest potential jump in price.

    The bottom line

    It’s all about expectations.

    Prior to the start of the second-quarter earnings season, investor relations departments and analysts massaged expectations downwards. The most obvious example is Goldman Sachs — its woes in consumer banking, from its attempt to sell GreenSky to its talks to offload its Apple credit card and savings account products, were well publicized.

    When Goldman reported a disappointing second quarter, then, it didn’t take investors aback. Its shares even rose almost 1% on the news. Astounding, if you think about the bank’s 58% fall in profits. But not that surprising, given that investors were prepared and were probably heaving a sigh of relief there wasn’t more bad news.

    Elsewhere, the strategy of managing expectations seems to be working. More than three quarters of S&P companies that have reported results have exceeded expectations, according to FactSet data. That reinforced hopes that the economy can elude a recession as inflation falls and rates remain high.

    Major indexes eked out small gains on that sentiment. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.31%, its eighth straight day of gains and longest winning streak since September 2019. The Nasdaq Composite was essentially flat and the S&P 500 climbed 0.24%.

    Thus far in July, the S&P has added 2.6%. By contrast, the small-cap Russell 2000 Index has risen almost 5% in the same period, CNBC’s Darla Mercado and Gina Francolla noted. It’s a sign that more firms are participating in the market rally, potentially giving stocks more room to grow.

    Tom De Luca, senior researcher at Vanguard, concurs. “Investors are saying loud and clear that they expect the current stock market rally to continue,” said De Luca. “Right now, short-term optimism is higher than we’ve seen since December 2021, right before the start of the 2022 bear market.”

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  • CNBC Daily Open: Expectations can matter more than numbers

    CNBC Daily Open: Expectations can matter more than numbers

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    A person walks towards Goldman Sachs headquarters in New York, US, on Thursday, July 6, 2023.

    Michael Nagle | Bloomberg | Getty Images

    This report is from today’s CNBC Daily Open, our new, international markets newsletter. CNBC Daily Open brings investors up to speed on everything they need to know, no matter where they are. Like what you see? You can subscribe here.

    What you need to know today

    Cautious rise
    U.S. stocks     edged up slightly Wednesday as traders digested earnings reports, with Tesla, Netflix and IBM reporting after the bell. Europe’s Stoxx 600 Index added 0.3% as oil and gas stocks rose 1.1%. The U.K.’s FTSE 100 had a much better day, advancing 1.8% after the country’s inflation figures came in cooler than expected. More on those stories below.

    Tesla’s record revenue
    Tesla booked record revenue of $24.93 billion, a quarter-on-quarter increase of almost 7% thanks to price cuts. However, that meant operating margin dropped to 9.6%, the lowest for the last five quarters. Still, net income increased 20% from last year to $2.7 billion. Both profit and revenue beat Wall Street’s expectations. Shares sank 4.5% in extended trading.

    Netflix’s crackdown worked
    Netflix’s second-quarter revenue rose 3% to $8.19 billion from a year earlier and net income increased 3.47% to $1.49 billion. Subscribers jumped 5.9 million last quarter as Netflix stopped password sharing. Netflix also removed its cheapest ad-free plan in the U.S. and U.K. Its shares plunged 8.66% in after-hours trading, but that’s a sign investors are selling shares to lock in profits, CNBC’s Alex Sherman wrote.

    Not all that is Goldman glitters
    Goldman Sachs’ profit fell 58% to $1.22 billion, or $3.08 a share, missing estimates. Goldman’s decline in trading and losses related to GreenSky sapped around $3.95 from per share earnings. Revenue fell 8% to $10.9 billion, marginally beating expectations.

    Some relief in the UK
    U.K. inflation in June cooled to 7.9% year over year, below economists’ projection of 8.2%. May’s consumer price index reading was 8.7%, so that’s a significant drop in the rate of price increases. On a monthly basis, prices increased by only 0.1%. The yield on the two-year U.K. government bond plunged 20 basis points on the news.

    [PRO] The Dow Theory
    The Dow Jones Industrial Average has a lesser-known sibling: the Dow Jones Transportation Average. Both indexes recently closed at a 52-week high, in a sign the rally is broadening. CNBC Pro’s Bob Pisani explains the “Dow Theory” and why it might matter to traders.

    The bottom line

    It’s all about expectations.

    Prior to the start of the second-quarter earnings season, investor relations departments and analysts massaged expectations downwards. The most obvious example is Goldman Sachs — its woes in consumer banking, from its attempt to sell GreenSky to its talks to offload its Apple credit card and savings account products, were well publicized.

    When Goldman reported a disappointing second quarter, then, it didn’t take investors aback. Its shares even rose almost 1% on the news. Astounding, if you think about the bank’s 58% fall in profits. But not that surprising, given that investors were prepared and were probably heaving a sigh of relief there wasn’t more bad news.

    Elsewhere, the strategy of managing expectations seems to be working. More than three quarters of S&P companies that have reported results have exceeded expectations, according to FactSet data. That reinforced hopes that the economy can elude a recession as inflation falls and rates remain high.

    Major indexes eked out small gains on that sentiment. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.31%, its eighth straight day of gains and longest winning streak since September 2019. The Nasdaq Composite was essentially flat and the S&P 500 climbed 0.24%.

    Thus far in July, the S&P has added 2.6%. By contrast, the small-cap Russell 2000 Index has risen almost 5% in the same period, CNBC’s Darla Mercado and Gina Francolla noted. It’s a sign that more firms are participating in the market rally, potentially giving stocks more room to grow.

    Tom De Luca, senior researcher at Vanguard, concurs. “Investors are saying loud and clear that they expect the current stock market rally to continue,” said De Luca. “Right now, short-term optimism is higher than we’ve seen since December 2021, right before the start of the 2022 bear market.”

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  • Netflix earnings bring big subscriber windfall, but stock gets dinged on light revenue forecast

    Netflix earnings bring big subscriber windfall, but stock gets dinged on light revenue forecast

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    Netflix Inc. wowed Wall Street with new subscribers Wednesday, but lighter-than-expected revenue and sales projections undercut the company’s stock in extended trading.

    Netflix
    NFLX,
    +0.59%
    reported that subscribers increased by a surprising 5.9 million in the second quarter of the year, blowing past analysts’ average estimate of 1.82 million. Netflix reported fiscal second-quarter net earnings of $1.49 billion, or $3.29 a share, compared with $3.20 a share in the year-ago quarter.

    Revenue improved to $8.19 billion from $7.97 billion a year ago. Analysts surveyed by FactSet had expected on average net earnings of $2.85 a share on revenue of $8.29 billion.

    For the third quarter, Netflix executives guided for earnings of $3.52 a share on $8.52 billion in revenue, while analysts on average were expecting earnings of $3.23 a share on sales of $8.66 billion.

    Free cash flow for the quarter was an eye-popping $1.3 billion, compared with about breakeven in the year-ago quarter.

    Shares dipped slid nearly 7% in after-hours trading immediately following the release of the results, after closing the regular session with a slight increase.

    Earlier Wednesday, the company ended its basic streaming plan in the U.S. ($9.99 a month) and U.K. for new and rejoining members in a move to press to add more subscribers to its ad-supported service ($6.99), which has accrued more than 5 million customers since its launch late last year. The news sent Netflix’s stock up 0.6% during the regular session.

    Read more: Netflix drops basic streaming plan in push for more users of ad-supported plan

    Netflix executives have hoped to goose their financial results with cheaper, ad-supported options and a crackdown on password sharing. In a letter to shareholders Wednesday, company executives said the success of paid shared accounts would be expanded to more countries.

    “We expect revenue growth will accelerate in the second half of 2023 as monetization grows from our most recent paid sharing launch and we expand our initiative across nearly all remaining countries plus the continued steady growth in our ad-supported plan,” Netflix executives wrote.

    In May, Netflix expanded paid sharing to more than 100 countries, which account for over 80% of its revenue. Now, it intends to “start to address account sharing between households in almost all of our remaining countries,” executives said.

    Expectations among investors heading into Netflix’s quarterly report were muted. The focus was on Netflix’s switch toward better monetization with an ad-supported service and a rolling crackdown on shared accounts. Analysts in particular were closely watching the performance of Netflix’s new “Basic with Ads” plan ($6.99 a month) and its effectiveness in stanching the defection of subscribers to competing services from Walt Disney Co.
    DIS,
    +1.27%
    and Apple Inc.
    AAPL,
    +0.71%    .

    Shares of Netflix have soared 62% so far this year, while the broader S&P 500 index
    SPX,
    +0.24%
    has advanced 19%.

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  • CNBC Daily Open: The long-awaited recession might not arrive

    CNBC Daily Open: The long-awaited recession might not arrive

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    People walk past the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) on July 12, 2023 in New York City.

    Spencer Platt | Getty Images News | Getty Images

    This report is from today’s CNBC Daily Open, our new, international markets newsletter. CNBC Daily Open brings investors up to speed on everything they need to know, no matter where they are. Like what you see? You can subscribe here.

    What you need to know today

    Waiting for earnings
    U.S. stocks     made slight gains Monday, but trading volume was lower than average as investors braced for second-quarter earning. European markets, on the other hand, fell. The regional Stoxx 600 index declined 0.6% as most sectors and bourses in the region fell.

    Separating the wheat from the people
    Russia terminated the Black Sea Grain Initiative, which allowed Ukraine to export food and fertilizers from three Ukrainian ports, hours before the agreement expired. The prices of wheat, corn and soybean all rose on the news. U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres previously described the deal as “indispensable” to global food security.

    Merger bonanza
    Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway reduced its stake in Activision Blizzard from 6.7% last year to 1.9% yesterday, according to a securities filing released Monday. The news comes as Microsoft inches closer to completing its $68.7 billion acquisition of Activision. Buffett previously revealed Berkshire added to its initial Activision stake in a bet the deal would close and cause shares to rise.

    Unraveling the Thread
    Meta’s Threads, its rival to Twitter, launched to great excitement. But not everyone is thrilled. House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan has asked Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg to hand over documents about content moderation on Threads, according to a letter obtained exclusively by CNBC. The request is related to an ongoing investigation of technology platform’s policies.

    [PRO] The S&P 5,400
    Ed Yardeni, president of Yardeni Research and previously chief investment strategist at various financial institutions, thinks the S&P 500 could go on an extended bull run and hit a record high of 5,400 within the next 18 months. Here’s why the market veteran is so optimistic.

    The bottom line

    Investors were cautiously optimistic yesterday.

    Major U.S. indexes edged up. The Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced 0.22% to hit its highest close this year. The S&P 500 gained 0.39% and the Nasdaq Composite climbed 0.93%.

    It should be noted, however, that trading volume was muted. The SPDR S&P 500 exchange-traded fund, which tracks the overall index, traded 52.4 million shares, below its 30-day average of 79.1 million.

    The slower pace of trading makes sense. Major companies are due to release their earnings reports, starting with Bank of America and Morgan Stanley on Tuesday as well as Goldman Sachs, Netflix and Tesla on Wednesday.  

    Investors braced for those reports — and they aren’t expecting good news. Analysts think second-quarter S&P 500 earnings will be more than 7% lower than they were a year ago, according to FactSet data.

    But the good news is last quarter’s earnings might be the floor. And things are looking up, not just for markets, but the economy. The long-awaited U.S. recession? Many analysts now think it’s not merely late — it might not even show up.

    With both consumer and producer price indexes cooling more than expected, “bringing inflation down to an acceptable level will not require a recession,” Goldman Sachs’ chief economist Jan Hatzius wrote, cutting his projection of a recession from 25% to 20%.

    JPMorgan Chase’s chief global markets strategist Marko Kolanovic has been skeptical of a soft landing. But even he noted that “the resilience of the US and global expansions should remain in place,” causing the bank to “downplay near-term recession risks.”

    And Ed Yardeni thinks the recession — albeit “a rolling recession,” meaning that different sectors of the economy have taken turns to contract — is already behind us. Instead, “now … we’re in a rolling recovery,” Yardeni said.

    As earnings reports are released, don’t look at companies’ figures for the past quarter. Keep an eye out for their projections for the rest of the year. We might yet see signs of hope the economy will continue growing.

     

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  • Dow scores 6th day of wins to start busy week for earnings

    Dow scores 6th day of wins to start busy week for earnings

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    U.S. stocks finished at new highs for the year on Monday to kick off a busy week for corporate earnings, with the Nasdaq leading the way up. The Dow Jones Industrial Average
    DJIA,
    +0.22%
    rose about 76 points, or 0.2%, ending near 34,585, based on preliminary FactSet data. The S&P 500 index
    SPX,
    +0.39%
    gained 0.4% and the Nasdaq Composite Index
    COMP,
    +0.93%
    closed up 0.9%. That was the Dow’s sixth straight day of wins and marked the highest close since April 2022 for all three major stock indexes, according to Dow Jones Market Data. Equities have rallied as the U.S. economy remains resilient in the face of sharply higher interest rates, keeping investors hopeful about a soft landing, instead of a recession. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Monday that she doesn’t anticipate a U.S. recession, in an interview with Bloomberg television. After several big banks reported on Friday, second-quarter earnings results continue with Tesla,
    TSLA,
    +3.20%
    Morgan Stanley
    MS,
    +0.69%    ,
    Goldman Sachs
    GS,
    +0.31%    ,
    Netflix
    NFLX,
    +1.84%
    and more on deck.

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  • The nation’s biggest banks are gearing up for more consumer struggles ahead

    The nation’s biggest banks are gearing up for more consumer struggles ahead

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    JPMorgan Chase & Co. Chief Executive Jamie Dimon on Friday said the U.S. economy was basically doing OK, even if customers were spending “a little more slowly.”

    But with rivals like Bank of America Corp., Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and American Express Co. set to report quarterly results this week, recession agita still prevails.

    For evidence, look no further than JPMorgan’s
    JPM,
    +0.60%
    own quarterly results. The bank’s second-quarter profit blew past expectations, but it set aside $2.9 billion during the second quarter to cover potentially bad loans, amid concerns that more consumers could run into more difficulty paying their bills on time as higher prices manage to stick at stores.

    That figure was well up from $1.1 billion in the same quarter last year, although still far below the billions it stowed away when the pandemic first hit. Similarly, Wells Fargo & Co.
    WFC,
    -0.34%
    on Friday set aside $1.7 billion for loan losses in this year’s second quarter, nearly triple what it was a year ago.

    The figures underscore the anxiety over the second half of this year, when many economists expect the economy to tilt into a recession. However, for the 500 companies in the S&P 500 index, Wall Street analysts still expect profit growth.

    Any downturn could be exacerbated by the pressure investors have put on companies, potentially via more layoffs and money-saving technology, to keep prices high and cut costs to replicate the abnormally large profit-margin gains they put up in 2021 and 2022. Businesses have indeed kept prices high, at least for many basic necessities, in an effort to cover their own higher costs and to pad profits.

    When Bank of America
    BAC,
    -1.89%
    reports this week, the results will narrow the lens on lending and spending in the U.S. Results from Morgan Stanley
    MS,
    -0.50%
    and Goldman Sachs
    GS,
    -0.76%
    will fill in the gaps on trading and deal-making. American Express
    AXP,
    -0.49%
    will give a more detailed breakdown of what consumers are still spending their money on, after Delta Air Lines Inc.
    DAL,
    -2.35%
    — which has a partnership with AmEx — said that travel demand remained “robust.”

    Banks shoveled more money into their reserve stockpiles in 2020 to bulk up against the pandemic’s shutdown of the economy. A year later, they started releasing those funds as the economy reopened and recovered. FactSet expects the broader banking sector to plump up its cash cushion during this year’s second quarter to account for more late loan payments or potential defaults.

    In a report on Friday, FactSet said the 15 banking-industry companies in the S&P 500 Index tracked by the firm were on pace to set aside $9.9 billion to cover losses from souring loans in the second quarter. That’s more than double the amount set aside a year ago. And if that $9.9 billion figure, based on actual and projected financial figures, ends up as the actual figure at the end of the quarter, it would mark the highest since the beginning of the pandemic and the third highest in five years, according to FactSet data.

    “The U.S. economy continues to be resilient,” Dimon said in a statement on Friday. “Consumer balance sheets remain healthy, and consumers are spending, albeit a little more slowly. Labor markets have softened somewhat, but job growth remains strong.”

    However, he noted difficulties in JPMorgan’s investment banking segment. And he said consumer savings were slowly eroding as inflation endures.

    As the nation’s biggest bank, JPMorgan has flexed its financial muscle this year, swallowing up First Republic after that bank got into trouble. But as it consolidates power and influence, building thicker armor against shocks to the economy, its financial results might not always reflect the struggles of its smaller rivals, where difficulties are likely felt more acutely. Analysts at Raymond James said that while JPMorgan remained a “best in breed” bank, its outlook pointed to “heightened challenges for smaller banks.”

    See also: Jamie Dimon says U.S. consumers are in ‘good shape.’ This evidence may prove otherwise.

    This week in earnings

    For the week ahead, 60 S&P 500 companies, including five from the Dow, will report quarterly results, according to FactSet. Two big oil companies, Halliburton Co.
    HAL,
    -2.28%
    and Baker Hughes Co.,
    BKR,
    -0.95%
    will report, as oil prices fall from levels seen last year. Results from two transportation giants — trucking company J.B. Hunt Transport Services
    JBHT,
    -0.42%
    and railroad operator CSX Corp.
    CSX,
    -0.27%
    — will also be a proxy for how much people are buying things and having them shipped. United Airlines Holdings Inc.
    UAL,
    -3.42%
    and American Airlines Group
    AAL,
    -1.68%
    will also report.

    The call to put on your calendar

    Netflix results: Hollywood shutdown, ‘slow-growth’ expectations. Hollywood’s writers — and now its actors — have gone on strike, and Netflix Inc.
    NFLX,
    -1.88%
    reports second-quarter results on Wednesday. The streaming platform will likely face questions over how much content it has left in the tank, as the strike upends studio-production schedules and leaves viewers with vast expanses of reruns. Still, Macquarie analyst Tim Nollen said that the production standstill “may ironically drive even more viewers to streaming services.”

    The writers and actors argue that the studio industry — increasingly consolidated, increasingly publicly traded, increasingly oriented around a handful of film franchises — has profited immensely while skimping on things benefits and streaming residuals. But after a decade-long rise, and a recent shift in investor focus from subscriber growth to profit growth, Netflix has emerged as one of the biggest production powerhouses in the business. And after years of flooding customers with new films and shows, it’s trying to squeeze out sales via more boring ways: things like a password-sharing crackdown and ads.

    Daniel Morgan, senior portfolio at Synovus Trust Co., said Netflix still faced a plenty of streaming competition amid “muted” subscriber growth. But Wedbush analyst Michael Pachter said investors should look at Netflix as a profitable, albeit more mature company.

    “We think Netflix is well-positioned in this murky environment as streamers are shifting strategy, and should be valued as an immensely profitable, slow-growth company,” Pachter said in a research note on Friday.

    “Even while the ad-supported tier is not yet directly accretive (we think it will be accretive over time), the ad-tier should continue to reduce churn and draw new subscribers to the service,” he continued.

    The number to watch

    Tesla sales. Electric-vehicle maker Tesla Inc. also reports second-quarter results on Wednesday. And like streaming, some analysts say the fervor for EVs has faded.

    However, they also said that Tesla
    TSLA,
    +1.25%
    had so far been immune from the malaise. And even though Elon Musk remains preoccupied with Twitter — which now faces competition from Meta Platforms Inc.’s
    META,
    -1.45%
    Threads — Tesla’s second-quarter deliveries were far above expectations. Sales are expected to be big. And one analyst said that price cuts, which Tesla has used to capture more of the auto market in China, were likely “fairly minimal” during the second quarter. But some analysts wondered what the blowout delivery figures would mean for margins. And the industry, broadly, has increasingly tested the patience of profit-minded investors.

    “We’ve now seen a market where demand is constrained, capital has been tighter, and there is less tolerance for EV related losses,” Barclays analysts said in a note last week, adding that there was a “step back from EV euphoria.”

    Claudia Assis contributed reporting.

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  • These companies reporting next week have a history of beating earnings estimates

    These companies reporting next week have a history of beating earnings estimates

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  • Movie and TV stars join picket lines in fight over the future of Hollywood

    Movie and TV stars join picket lines in fight over the future of Hollywood

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    LOS ANGELES (AP) — “Ted Lasso” star Jason Sudeikis, Rosario Dawson and other top movie and TV actors joined picket lines alongside screenwriters Friday on the first full day of a walkout that has become Hollywood’s biggest labor fight in decades.

    A day after the dispute brought production to a standstill across the entertainment industry, Sudeikis was among the picketers outside NBC in New York pressing for progress following the breakdown of contract talks with studios and streaming services. Dawson, star of the film “Rent” and the “Star Wars” TV series “Ahsoka,” joined picketers outside Warner Bros. studios in Burbank, California.

    “Lord of the Rings” star Sean Astin marched with chanting protesters outside Netflix’s offices in Hollywood. Also present at Netflix were “Titanic” and “Unforgiven” actor Frances Fisher and “The Nanny” star Fran Drescher, who is president of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists.

    The actors’ arrival energized the picket lines outside Netflix, where music blared and the sidewalks were packed with demonstrators.

    Hollywood productions and promotional tours around the world have been put on indefinite hold as actors join writers on the picket lines.

    SAG-AFTRA president Fran Drescher and SAG-AFTRA National Executive Director and Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, center, pose with SAG-AFTRA members during a press conference announcing a strike by The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists on Thursday, July, 13, 2023, in Los Angeles. This marks the first time since 1960 that actors and writers will picket film and television productions at the same time. (AP Photo/Chris Pizzello)

    Hollywood actors are joining screenwriters in the first dual strike from the two unions in more than six decades, with huge consequences for the film and television industry.

    Smoke rises as an engine for an Epsilon S rocket exploded during a test at the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency's testing site in Noshiro, Akita Prefecture, northeastern Japan, Friday, July 14, 2023. (Kyodo News via AP)

    A rocket being developed by the Japanese space agency has exploded during testing but there were no reports of injuries.

    This image released by Apple TV+ shows Lee Pace, left, and Terrence Mann in a scene from "Foundation." (Apple TV+ via AP)

    A sprawling, mighty galaxy was created in season one of “Foundation.” Now it’s time to rip it down. Season two of the ambitious Apple TV+ sci-fi series flashes forward some 140 years and it’s quickly clear that the clones who form the story’s authoritarian order are losing their grip.

    Elsewhere, “Once Upon a Time” actor Ginnifer Goodwin stood with protesters at Paramount Pictures.

    The famous faces of Oscar and Emmy winners will likely be seen with some regularity on picket lines in New York and Los Angeles, adding star power to the demonstrations outside studios and corporate offices.

    The walkout is the first double-barreled strike by actors and screenwriters in more than six decades.

    In recent weeks, many actors made a show of solidarity with the 11,500 writers, who walked out in May. On Thursday, 65,000 members of the actors’ union formally joined them on strike.

    The two guilds have similar issues with studios and streaming services. They are concerned about contracts keeping up with inflation and about residual payments, which compensate creators and actors for use of their material beyond the original airing, such as in reruns or on streaming services. The unions also want to put up guardrails against the use of artificial intelligence mimicking their work on film and television.

    Many on the picket lines took aim at Disney chief executive Bob Iger, who said Wednesday that the damage the strikes will do to the entertainment economy is “a shame.”

    Justine Bateman, right, speaks outside Netflix during a Writers Guild rally as a strike by The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists is announced on Thursday, July 13, 2023, in Los Angeles. This marks the first time since 1960 that actors and writers will picket film and television productions at the same time. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill)

    Justine Bateman, right, speaks outside Netflix during a Writers Guild rally as a strike by The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists is announced in Los Angeles. (AP Photo/Mark J. Terrill)

    “I think that when Bob Iger talks about what a shame it is, he needs to remember that in 1980, CEOs like him made 30 times what their lowest worker was making,” actor Sean Gunn, who starred in “Guardians of the Galaxy,” said outside Netflix.

    Now Iger “makes 400 times what his lowest worker is. And I think that’s a shame, Bob. And maybe you should take a look in the mirror and ask yourself, ‘Why is that?’”

    No talks are planned, and no end is in sight for the work stoppage. It is the first time both guilds have walked off sets since 1960, when then-actor Ronald Reagan was SAG’s leader.

    “What we won in 1960 was our health and pension plans and the existence of residuals. That was the most important strike in LA union history, and now we’re on strike together again, and honestly, this strike is even bigger,” Adam Conover, host of the TV series “Adam Ruins Everything” and member of the Writers Guild negotiating committee, said outside Netflix. “We’re going to win. If you are gaining momentum like we are, 70-odd days into a strike, you are going to win.”

    Conover was one of many picketers, including Sudeikis, who are members of both unions.

    The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which represents employers including Disney, Netflix, Amazon and others, has lamented the walkout, saying it will hurt thousands of workers in industries that support film and television production.

    The actors’ strike will affect more than filming. Stars will no longer be allowed to promote their work through red carpet premieres or personal appearances. They cannot campaign for Emmy awards or take part in auditions or rehearsals.

    The strike triggered cancellations of red carpet events scheduled for next week for “Special Ops: Lioness,” starring Zoe Saldaña and Nicole Kidman, and Christopher Nolan’s “Oppenheimer.”

    A “Haunted Mansion” premiere event at Disneyland on Saturday was set to go on as planned, but with no actors in attendance to promote the film.

    Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said it was clear that the entertainment industry “is at a historic inflection point.” She urged all parties to work around the clock until an agreement is reached.

    “This affects all of us and is essential to our overall economy,” Bass said in a statement.

    The writers’ strike had already stopped much of television production, and the actors joining them immediately led to a shooting shutdown for many major films, including “Deadpool 3,” “Gladiator 2” and the eighth installment of Tom Cruise’s “Mission Impossible” series. All are scheduled for release next year.

    The writers’ strike also shut down late-night talk shows and “Saturday Night Live,” as well as several scripted shows that have either had their writers’ rooms or production paused, including “Stranger Things” on Netflix, “Hacks” on Max and “Family Guy” on Fox. Many more are sure to follow them now that performers also have been pulled.

    ___

    This story has been corrected to fix the misspelling of Jason Sudeikis’ last name and Ginnifer Goodwin’s first name.

    ___

    Associated Press Writer Krysta Fauria contributed.

    ___

    For more on the Hollywood strikes, visit https://apnews.com/hub/hollywood-strikes/

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  • Actors strike looms as midnight deadline approaches, union slams producers’ tactics

    Actors strike looms as midnight deadline approaches, union slams producers’ tactics

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    People carry signs as SAG-AFTRA members walk the picket line in solidarity with striking WGA (Writers Guild of America) workers outside Netflix offices on July 11, 2023 in Los Angeles, California. I

    Mario Tama | Getty Images News | Getty Images

    Another strike is looming over Hollywood.

    If extended talks between the Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers fail by midnight in Los Angeles, 160,000 actors will join already-striking writers on the picket lines on Thursday.

    Heading into negotiations last month, Hollywood’s talent was looking to improve wages, working conditions, and health and pension benefits, as well as create guardrails for the use of artificial intelligence in future television and film productions.

    The actors’ union agreed to a request from studios and streaming services on Tuesday to meet with federal mediators in one final push to reach a new contract deal, but members said they remain ready to walk off sets should negotiations fall through. The union has already granted one extension to its contract, which was originally set to expire July 1.

    SAG-AFTRA disputed reports that the AMPTP made the request for mediation after an emergency meeting Monday with several top Hollywood executives. The union said media reports were published before it was informed that producers were requesting mediation.

    “We will not be distracted from negotiating in good faith to secure a fair and just deal by the expiration of our agreement,” SAG-AFTRA said in a statement Tuesday. “We are committed to the negotiating process and will explore and exhaust every possible opportunity to make a deal, however we are not confident that the employers have any intention of bargaining toward an agreement.”

    “The AMPTP has abused our trust and damaged the respect we have for them in this process,” SAG-AFTRA’s statement continued. “We will not be manipulated by this cynical ploy to engineer an extension when the companies have had more than enough time to make a fair deal.”

    SAG-AFTRA’s comments come as damning reports have surfaced about tactics studio producers allegedly plan to implement against the currently striking Writers Guild of America — namely, that producers don’t plan on attempting to negotiate with writers for several months. According to the reports, producers expect that the underpaid workers will run out of money and possibly lose their homes and be forced to come to the bargaining table.

    Writers have been on strike for two months, leading a number of projects that did not have completed scripts to pause their productions.

    Already Netflix has postponed the production start of the fifth and final season of “Stranger Things,” Warner Bros. Discovery‘s “Game of Thrones” prequel “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms: The Hedge Knight” shuttered its writers room, and Disney and Marvel’s “Thunderbolts” and “Blade” have paused production.

    Some productions have been able to continue, albeit without writers on set, as their scripts were already completed. However, if SAG-AFTRA strikes, those shows and films will immediately stop shooting.

    Disclosure: Comcast is the parent company of NBCUniversal and CNBC. NBCUniversal is a member of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

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  • Meta’s new Twitter rival app Threads gets tens of millions of sign-ups in its first day

    Meta’s new Twitter rival app Threads gets tens of millions of sign-ups in its first day

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    Tens of millions of people have quickly signed up to Meta’s new app, Threads, as it aims to compete with Twitter — a sign that users are looking for an alternative to the social media platform that has undergone a series of unpopular changes since Elon Musk bought it.

    Meta Platforms’ CEO Mark Zuckerberg said Thursday that 30 million people had registered for the app, including 10 million in the first seven hours of its launch Wednesday in the U.S. and over 100 other countries, including Britain, Australia, Canada and Japan.

    Threads is billed as a text-based version of Meta’s photo-sharing app Instagram that the company says provides “a new, separate space for real-time updates and public conversations.”

    Instagram users can log in with their existing usernames and follow the same accounts on the new app, giving Threads users a ready-made audience and an edge over other Twitter challengers like Bluesky and Mastodon.

    “I think I’ll just see — I’ll keep Twitter for a while and then if everyone moves over there (to Threads), then I’ll probably move,” said Javi de Andreas, a 24-year-old researcher in London.

    He added that Instagram “feels like a bit more reliable just in terms of nothing really changes.”

    There was plenty of excitement among Threads users about the opportunity to make a fresh start on a new social media app, giving Threads a “first day of school” vibe.

    Early adopters included celebrities like chef Gordon Ramsay, pop star Shakira and actor Jack Black as well as Airbnb, Guinness World Records, Netflix, Vogue magazine and other media outlets.

    There were also glitches, annoyance about the lack of a chronological feed and gripes about missing features — raising the question of whether the initial burst of interest would lead to sustained growth that could pose a meaningful challenge to Twitter.

    “The euphoria around a new service and this initial explosion will probably settle down,” said Paolo Pescatore, a technology analyst at PP Foresight. “But it is apparent that this alternative is here to stay and will prove to be a worthy rival given all of Twitter’s woes.”

    Teething problems for Threads include Zuckerberg’s posts — or Threads as they’re dubbed — not loading in several countries. But his replies to other users did appear.

    Instagram CEO Adam Mosseri acknowledged the early issues.

    “The real test is not if we can build up a lot of hype, but if you all find enough value in the app to keep using it ove time,” Mosseri posted in a thread.

    “And there are tons of basics that are missing: search, hashtags, a following feed” and direct messaging, he said. “We’re on it,” but ”it’ll take time.”

    Threads does have buttons to like, repost, reply to or quote a thread, and users see the number of likes and replies a post has received. Posts are limited to 500 characters, which is more than Twitter’s 280-character threshold for most users, and can include links, photos and videos up to five minutes long.

    Some questioned whether it made sense to seek to combine Twitter and Instagram users, which are two distinct online groups. Twitter is tailored for quick and short updates, while Instagram is best for visually creative posts.

    An Argentine archbishop chosen by Pope Francis to head the Vatican office that ensures doctrinal orthodoxy concedes he made mistakes in handling a 2019 case of a priest accused of sexual abuse of minors.

    Allisen Corpuz poses with the winner's trophy after the U.S. Women's Open golf tournament at the Pebble Beach Golf Links, Sunday, July 9, 2023, in Pebble Beach, Calif. (AP Photo/Darron Cummings)

    Allisen Corpuz picked the right time and the right place for her first big win. She won the first U.S.

    FILE - PGA Tour Commissioner Jay Monahan speaks during a news conference before the Travelers Championship golf tournament at TPC River Highlands, June 22, 2022, in Cromwell, Conn. Monahan is returning to work just over a month after he stepped away for a “medical situation” during a tumultuous time of working out a surprise commercial agreement with the Saudi backers of LIV Golf. (AP Photo/Seth Wenig, File)

    The Washington Post is reporting former AT&T Chairman Randall Stephenson has resigned from the PGA Tour policy board.

    FILE - Roy Herron hugs and shakes hands with supporters with help from Wesley Warrilow, right, after being defeated by Stephen Fincher for U.S. representative, Nov. 2, 2010, at the Elks Lodge in Dresden, Tenn. Herron, a longtime Tennessee state lawmaker and former chairman of the state Democratic Party, died Sunday, July 9, 2023, from injuries sustained in a jet ski accident. He was 69 years old. (Katie Brake/The Jackson Sun via AP, File)

    Roy Herron, a longtime Tennessee state lawmaker and former chairperson of the state Democratic Party, has died from injuries sustained in a jet ski accident.

    “Some people will want to keep it separate from Instagram for numerous and very good reasons,” Pescatore said. “This is something that Meta might have to address, which could halt its progress.”

    Meta’s new offering also has raised data privacy concerns. The company has held off on rolling it out in the European Union, citing regulatory uncertainty.

    The 27-nation EU has strict data privacy rules and is set to start enforcing a new set of digital rules aimed at clamping down on Big Tech companies and limiting what they can do with users’ personal information.

    Threads could collect a wide range of personal information, including health, financial, contacts, browsing and search history, location data, purchases and “sensitive info,” according to its data privacy disclosure on the App Store.

    Threads poses a fresh headache for Musk, who acquired Twitter last year for $44 billion. Analysts said combining Twitter-style features with Instagram’s look and feel would drive user engagement.

    Musk has made a series of changes that have triggered backlash, the latest being daily limits on the number of tweets people can view to try to stop unauthorized scraping of potentially valuable data.

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