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The Walt Disney Company reported a 13% increase in quarterly earnings on Wednesday — to $21.8 billion.
Disney’s vast, global portfolio includes theme parks, resorts, movies, streaming and broadcast channels including Disney+, Hulu, ESPN+, and ABC.
Attendance at themes parks and resorts drove revenue this quarter. Disney’s Parks, Experiences and Products division increased its profits by 20% to $2.2 billion.
Disney’s in-person offerings performed better than streaming
Profits were not evenly distributed across Disney’s various businesses.
Disney+ lost some four million paid subscribers this quarter, dropping to 157.8 million. ESPN+ increased slightly to 25.3 million subscribers and Hulu remained steady at 48.2 million subscribers.
Bob Iger, The Walt Disney Company’s CEO, attributed the Disney+ downturn partly to a «maturation process.» The streaming service launched in 2019, and in the beginning, Iger said their goal was to, «flood the digital shelves as much as possible.» He said that lead to a lot of content that did not increase subscriptions and that the company plans to cut back on production.
Late last year, Disney+ increased the price of its ad-free service from $7.
