Walt Disney Co. rallied on Wednesday after its new video-streaming platform attracted 10 million customers, sprinting to a milestone that the company called “remarkable.”
The service, Disney+, was just made available Tuesday in the U.S. and Canada, though the company had been offering it earlier in the Netherlands as a test.
“With 10 million subscribers on its Disney+ service in the first full day of availability, Disney should silence naysayers who expressed reservations about a pivot to streaming,” said Geetha Ranganathan, a media analyst for Bloomberg Intelligence. “It took HBO Now about four years to reach about 10 million streaming subscribers.”
Disney shares reversed losses after the company announced the subscriber figure, with the stock climbing as much as 4.1% on Wednesday. Netflix Inc. shares fell by 1.9% as that company’s investors assess how big a threat Disney+ will be.