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Netflix Shares Soar on Price Hikes and Record Subscriber Gains

FILED - 14 May 2024, North Rhine-Westphalia, Cologne: The word "Netflix" shines brightly at the presentation of one of its series. Photo: Rolf Vennenbernd/dpa
FILED - 14 May 2024, North Rhine-Westphalia, Cologne: The word "Netflix" shines brightly at the presentation of one of its series. Photo: Rolf Vennenbernd/dpa
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Netflix Shares Soar on Price Hikes and Record Subscriber Gains

FILED - 14 May 2024, North Rhine-Westphalia, Cologne: The word "Netflix" shines brightly at the presentation of one of its series. Photo: Rolf Vennenbernd/dpa
FILED - 14 May 2024, North Rhine-Westphalia, Cologne: The word "Netflix" shines brightly at the presentation of one of its series. Photo: Rolf Vennenbernd/dpa

Netflix reaffirmed its dominance of the streaming video market on Tuesday, as its mixture of live sporting events, popular returning series - and singular moments, such as a football halftime performance by Beyonce - helped attract a record number of subscribers over the holiday quarter.
The company added 18.9 million subscribers in its fourth quarter to bring its total global subscriber base to nearly 302 million customers - a number that dwarfs its Hollywood streaming rivals, Reuters reported.
Netflix sought to capitalize on its galloping popularity by raising prices in the US, Canada, Portugal and Argentina as it spends more on programming. In the US, the company's ad-supported service will cost $7.99 a month, up from $6.99, while the premium package will cost $24.99, up 9% from existing pricing.

Investors reacted enthusiastically to the results, sending Netflix's stock surging about 13% in extended trade, lifting its stock market value by almost $50 billion. Over the last year, Netflix shares have gained more than 77%, outpacing the S&P 500's 24% rise.

"Netflix reaffirms its leadership position and is absolutely running away in the streaming market," said Paolo Pescatore of PP Foresight. "It is now flexing its muscles by adjusting prices given its far stronger and diversified programming slate compared to rivals."

The company said its fourth-quarter programming slate surpassed its own expectations, with viewers bingeing on the second season of its dystopian survival thriller "Squid Game," which the company said is on track to become one of its most-watched original series.
Netflix's deepening investment in live-streamed events is drawing tens of millions of viewers. The heavyweight boxing match between Jake Paul and Mike Tyson in November attracted 65 million streams. The two National Football League games on Christmas Day, one featuring Beyonce's halftime performance, brought in an average of 30 million global viewers, ranking among the most-streamed competitions in league history.
“To state the obvious, it’s content that drives users to streaming services," said Forrester Research Director Mike Proulx. "With the biggest bump in subscribers ever, Netflix’s attention to quality content is the reason for an overall strong year and fourth quarter."
Netflix said it has shaken off the impacts of COVID-19 and the 2023 Hollywood writers' and actors' strikes, and is delivering returning seasons of its most popular shows, including the Addams Family series "Wednesday," and the supernatural "Stranger Things."
It will also broadcast more live events, including weekly installments of WWE "Monday Night Raw" wrestling. It secured the rights for the FIFA Women's World Cup in 2027 and 2031, a deal which it says illustrates its strategy to deliver special-events programming, rather than regular season sports packages.
Such live events are attractive to advertisers, because they draw audiences that watch in real time.
"We exceeded our ads revenue target in the fourth quarter," said Netflix Co-CEO Greg Peters, adding, "We doubled our ads revenue year over year last year. We expect to double it again this year."
The company said the ad-supported version of its service accounts for 55% of its new sign-ups in countries where it is available.
Macquarie Equity Research analyst Tim Nollen predicted that ad revenue will increase to $2 billion this year, as more people sign up for the company's advertising-supported tier and Netflix's advertising technology matures. Live events will continue to drive sign-ups, he wrote in an investor note published prior to Netflix's earnings report.
This quarter will also mark the last time Netflix reports subscriber additions, as the company emphasizes other performance metrics including revenue and profit - a change analysts attribute to slowing subscriber growth.
The company reported per-share earnings of $4.27, beating Wall Street's forecast of $4.20 per share, according to an average of projections from 34 analysts. Annual operating income exceeded $10 billion for the first time in the company's history.
Revenue rose 16% over the same time a year ago, to $10.2 billion, compared with Wall Street's estimates of $10.1 billion for the quarter, according to LSEG. The jump in subscribers in the quarter did not create a similar spike in revenue because sign-ups occurred throughout the quarter, said one person familiar with the matter.
The company revised its guidance, projecting revenue of $43.5 billion to $44.5 billion in 2025, an increase of a half-billion dollars over the prior forecast. The updated guidance reflects improved business fundamentals, the company said.
Netflix's board also approved an incremental $15 billion to repurchase shares, which brings the total buyback authorization to $17.1 billion.

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Perry Bamonte, Keyboardist and Guitarist for The Cure, Dies at 65

Perry Bamonte of The Cure performs at North Island Credit Union Amphitheater on May 20, 2023 in Chula Vista, California. (Getty Images/AFP)
Perry Bamonte of The Cure performs at North Island Credit Union Amphitheater on May 20, 2023 in Chula Vista, California. (Getty Images/AFP)
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Perry Bamonte, Keyboardist and Guitarist for The Cure, Dies at 65

Perry Bamonte of The Cure performs at North Island Credit Union Amphitheater on May 20, 2023 in Chula Vista, California. (Getty Images/AFP)
Perry Bamonte of The Cure performs at North Island Credit Union Amphitheater on May 20, 2023 in Chula Vista, California. (Getty Images/AFP)

Perry Bamonte, keyboardist and guitarist in The Cure, has died at 65, the English indie rock band confirmed through their official website on Friday.

In a statement, the band wrote that Bamonte died "after a short illness at home" on Christmas Day.

"It is with enormous sadness that ‌we confirm ‌the death of our ‌great ⁠friend and ‌bandmate Perry Bamonte who passed away after a short illness at home over Christmas," the statement said, adding he was a "vital part of The Cure story."

The statement said Bamonte was ⁠a full-time member of The Cure since 1990, ‌playing guitar, six-string bass, ‍and keyboards, and ‍performed in more than 400 shows.

Bamonte, ‍born in London, England, in 1960, joined the band's road crew in 1984, working alongside his younger brother Daryl, who worked as tour manager for The Cure.

Bamonte first worked as ⁠an assistant to co-founder and lead vocalist, Robert Smith, before becoming a full member after keyboardist Roger O'Donnell left the band in 1990.

Bamonte's first album with The Cure was "Wish" in 1992. He continued to work with them on the next three albums.

He also had various acting ‌roles in movies: "Judge Dredd,About Time" and "The Crow."

Entertainment

First Bond Game in a Decade Hit by Two-month Delay

'007 First Light' depicts a younger Bond earning his license to kill. Ina FASSBENDER / AFP
'007 First Light' depicts a younger Bond earning his license to kill. Ina FASSBENDER / AFP
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First Bond Game in a Decade Hit by Two-month Delay

'007 First Light' depicts a younger Bond earning his license to kill. Ina FASSBENDER / AFP
'007 First Light' depicts a younger Bond earning his license to kill. Ina FASSBENDER / AFP

A Danish video game studio said it was delaying the release of the first James Bond video game in over a decade by two months to "refine the experience".

Fans will now have to wait until May 27 to play "007 First Light" featuring Ian Fleming's world-famous spy, after IO Interactive said on Tuesday it was postponing the launch to add some final touches.

"007 First Light is our most ambitious project to date, and the team has been fully focused on delivering an unforgettable James Bond experience," the Danish studio wrote on X.

Describing the game as "fully playable", IO Interactive said the two additional months would allow their team "to further polish and refine the experience", giving players "the strongest possible version at launch".

The game, which depicts a younger Bond earning his license to kill, is set to feature "globe-trotting, spycraft, gadgets, car chases, and more", IO Interactive added.

It has been more than a decade since a video game inspired by Bond was released. The initial release date was scheduled for March 27.

Entertainment

Movie Review: An Electric Timothee Chalamet Is the Consummate Striver in Propulsive ‘Marty Supreme’

Timothee Chalamet attends the premiere of "Marty Supreme" at Regal Times Square on Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, in New York. (AP)
Timothee Chalamet attends the premiere of "Marty Supreme" at Regal Times Square on Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, in New York. (AP)
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Movie Review: An Electric Timothee Chalamet Is the Consummate Striver in Propulsive ‘Marty Supreme’

Timothee Chalamet attends the premiere of "Marty Supreme" at Regal Times Square on Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, in New York. (AP)
Timothee Chalamet attends the premiere of "Marty Supreme" at Regal Times Square on Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2025, in New York. (AP)

“Everybody wants to rule the world,” goes the Tears for Fears song we hear at a key point in “Marty Supreme,” Josh Safdie’s nerve-busting adrenaline jolt of a movie starring a never-better Timothee Chalamet.

But here’s the thing: everybody may want to rule the world, but not everybody truly believes they CAN. This, one could argue, is what separates the true strivers from the rest of us.

And Marty — played by Chalamet in a delicious synergy of actor, role and whatever fairy dust makes a performance feel both preordained and magically fresh — is a striver. With every fiber of his restless, wiry body. They should add him to the dictionary definition.

Needless to say, Marty is a New Yorker.

Also needless to say, Chalamet is a New Yorker.

And so is Safdie, a writer-director Chalamet has called “the street poet of New York.” So, where else could this story be set?

It’s 1952, on Manhattan’s Lower East Side. Marty Mauser is a salesman in his uncle’s shoe store, escaping to the storeroom for a hot tryst with his (married) girlfriend. This witty opening sequence won’t be the only thing recalling “Uncut Gems,” co-directed by Safdie with his brother Benny before the two split for solo projects. That film, which feels much like the precursor to “Marty Supreme,” began as a trip through the shiny innards of a rare opal, only to wind up inside Adam Sandler’s colon, mid-colonoscopy.

Sandler’s Howard Ratner was a New York striver, too, but sadder, and more troubled. Marty is young, determined, brash — with an eye always to the future. He’s a great salesman: “I could sell shoes to an amputee,” he boasts, crassly. But what he’s plotting to unveil to the world has nothing to do with shoes. It’s about table tennis.

How likely is it that this Jewish kid from the Lower East Side can become the very face of a sport in America, soon to be “staring at you from the cover of a Wheaties box?”

To Marty, perfectly likely. Still, he knows nobody in the US cares about table tennis. He’s so determined to prove everyone wrong, starting at the British Open in London, that when there’s a snag obtaining cash for his trip, he brandishes a gun at a colleague to get it.

Shaking off that sorta-armed robbery thing, Marty arrives in London, where he fast-talks his way into a suite at the Ritz. Here, he spies fellow guest Kay Stone (Gwyneth Paltrow, in a wise, stylish return to the screen), a former movie star married to an insufferable tycoon (“Shark Tank” personality Kevin O’Leary, one of many nonactors here.)

Kay’s skeptical, but Marty finds a way to woo her. Really, all he has to say is: “Come watch me.” Once she sees him play, she’s sneaking into his room in a lace corselet.

This would be a good time to stop and consider Chalamet’s subtly transformed appearance. He is stick-thin — duh, he never stops moving. His mustache is skimpy. His skin is acne-scarred — just enough to erase any movie-star sheen. Most strikingly, his eyes, behind the round spectacles, are beady — and smaller. Definitely not those movie-star eyes.

But then, nearly all the faces in “Marty Supreme” are extraordinary. In a movie with more than 100 characters, we have known actors (Fran Drescher, Abel Ferrara); nonacting personalities (O’Leary, and an excellent Tyler Okonma (Tyler, The Creator) as Marty’s friend Wally); and exciting newcomers like Odessa A’Zion as Marty’s feisty girlfriend Rachel.

There are also a slew of nonactors in small parts, plus cameos from the likes of David Mamet and even high wire artist Philippe Petit. The dizzying array makes one curious how it all came together — is casting director Jennifer Venditti taking interns? Production notes tell us that for one hustling scene at a bowling alley, young men were recruited from a sports trading-card convention.

Elsewhere on the creative team, composer Daniel Lopatin succeeds in channeling both Marty’s beating heart and the ricochet of pingpong balls in his propulsive score. The script by Safdie and cowriter Ronald Bronstein, loosely based on real-life table tennis hustler Marty Reisman, beats with its own, never-stopping pulse. The same breakneck aesthetic applies to camera work by Darius Khondji.

Back now to London, where Marty makes the finals against Japanese player Koto Endo (Koto Kawaguchi, like his character a deaf table tennis champion). “I’ll be dropping a third atom bomb on them,” he brags — not his only questionable World War II quip. But Endo, with his unorthodox paddle and grip, prevails.

After a stint as a side act with the Harlem Globetrotters, including pingpong games with a seal — you’ll have to take our word for this, folks, we’re running low on space — Marty returns home, determined to make the imminent world championships in Tokyo.

But he's in trouble — remember he took cash at gunpoint? Worse, he has no money.

So Marty’s on the run. And he’ll do anything, however messy or dangerous, to get to Japan. Even if he has to totally debase himself (mark our words), or endanger friends — or abandon loyal and brave Rachel.

Is there something else for Marty, besides his obsessive goal? If so, he doesn’t know it yet. But the lyrics of another song used in the film are instructive here: “Everybody’s got to learn sometime.”

So can a single-minded striver ultimately learn something new about his own life?

We'll have to see. As Marty might say: “Come watch me.”