• snooggums@kbin.social
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    11 months ago

    Most people don’t know that Netflix funded a lot of its original programming by taking on a lot of debt. The company currently has over $11 billion in outstanding debt, most of which comes due in 4 years.

    While I did not know that about Netflix, taking on debt to keep up with business needs is how the vast majority of businesses grow so it shouldn’t be a surprise.

    • xyzzy@lemm.ee
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      11 months ago

      I know, but the size of new debt (relative to their revenues at the time) surprised industry observers back in the day. There were lots of articles about it.

      The company declared positive cash flow in 2021 ($5.12 B) for the first time since 2011, and then earnings dropped in 2022 to ($4.49 B). Subscriber numbers continue to creep up relatively slowly. The debt is due in four years. While I think Netflix as a business is probably in the best shape relative to its peers, I think there’s a chance that they may need to issue new stock around that time frame. That would be a very bad signal to Wall Street. It’ll be very interesting to see where they and the rest of the industry are at that time.