Streaming has become an increasingly competitive industry in recent years. Disney, for instance, reported in August that it had about 221 million subscriptions across its bundle of services. It will start offering a lower-priced advertising tier for Disney+ in December.
Mr. Hastings expressed relief about the company’s financial results during a video interview conducted by an analyst that was posted by Netflix on Tuesday evening.
“Well, thank God we’re done with shrinking quarters,” Mr. Hastings said, laughing.
Netflix is breaking with convention in other ways this fall. The company plans to release “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” in 600 theaters across the United States for one week beginning on Nov. 23 ahead of its streaming debut, the first time the company has struck a deal with the nation’s largest theater chains at once. The movie, written and directed by Rian Johnson, is the anticipated follow-up to the 2019 hit starring Daniel Craig as the Delphic detective Benoit Blanc.
Netflix told employees this year that it was also planning to crack down on password sharing, which allows users to watch content without paying for a subscription. The research firm MoffettNathanson estimates that 16 percent of Netflix users share passwords, more than any other major U.S. streaming service. Netflix said in April that passwords were being shared with an additional 100 million households, according to its estimate.
The company has also cracked down on costs. In May, Netflix laid off about 150 workers across the company, primarily in the United States, or about 2 percent of its total work force. Netflix said in a statement that the cuts had been spurred by the company’s slower revenue growth.
Despite the changes, Netflix hasn’t yet been able to reverse a precipitous decline in its share price. The company’s stock has tumbled more than 60 percent over the last year amid a broader market slump, as investors and analysts grapple with the economics of streaming video.
During the third quarter, Netflix released a mix of films and TV shows, including “The Gray Man,” a big-budget action film starring Ryan Gosling and Chris Evans and directed by Joe and Anthony Russo, the sibling filmmakers behind “Avengers: Infinity War.” Other popular titles included the serial killer show “Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story”; the romantic drama “Purple Hearts”; and “Stranger Things,” which released the second half of Season 4 near the end of last quarter.
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