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Disney Earns $22.6B in Revenue, Deadpool & Wolverine Spark Box Office Success as $1.3B Profit, and Disney+ Grows 4.4M Subscribers

Walt Disney really topped Wall Street's expectations, mainly because of the blockbuster movie, Deadpool & Wolverine. Its global box office flocked in much-needed cash for Disney's financials, which has enabled it to beat the earnings predicted for its fourth fiscal quarter.

Disney's Entertainment division experienced its operating income more than double to $1.1 billion because of the critical and box-office success achieved by Deadpool & Wolverine, which has grossed over $1.3 billion worldwide. That also helped offset declines in other areas, including the company's Experience division, which has been threatened by international theme parks seeing fewer visits and bearing higher costs for ESPN's broadcasts.

It certainly had some tough spots in certain lines of business; however, Disney turned around with an adjusted profit of $1.14 per share out of the estimate by Wall Street analysts at $1.10. Revenues for this quarter hit $22.6 billion, more than what Wall Street's estimates were at $22.45 billion. The company also could increase its operating income up by 23%, reaching nearly $3.7 billion.

Disney's streaming services helped lift the bottom line: Disney+ ended up adding 4.4 million subscribers outside of India and, for the second consecutive quarter, company streaming services are operating profitably, generating $321 million in combined operating profit for Disney+.

On the other hand, management at Disney is quite optimistic about the outlook: the house projects high single-digit earnings growth in fiscal year 2025 and more in 2026 and 2027. As CEO Bob Iger puts it, who has all along been confident about the company strategy, especially steps taken to cost-cut and revamp its film and TV units after a pretty tough time.

The theme park business segment at Disney was down 6% in revenues. Parks overseas remained under pressure from cost increases and competition, notably on the part of the Olympics in Paris. The same can be said about ESPN, which was battered by higher programming and production costs from college football.

Meanwhile, with the continuation of Deadpool & Wolverine's success and healthy performance from the streaming side, Disney is likely to reap long-term benefits as it is successfully leaning on a winning strategy, and the future goes well as expected.