Netflix names chief content officer Ted Sarandos as co-CEO amid slow growth

Ted Sarandos has been just named co-chief executive officer at Netflix and already he faces a difficult task: Soothing investor anxiety about slowing growth at the video-streaming giant.

The firm tapped its longtime chief content officer to take the top job, alongside current CEO Reed Hastings, on a day when it delivered a disappointing subscriber forecast and sent its shares plunging as much as 15 per cent in late trading. They recovered slightly, but were still down 7.77 per cent during early trade in New York on Friday.

The world’s largest paid streaming service expects to sign up 2.5 million new subscribers in the third quarter, compared with the more than 5 million expected on Wall Street.

That’s a steep comedown from Netflix’s ferocious growth in the first half of the year, when pandemic-fuelled lockdowns sent consumers scrambling to sign up for the service. Netflix added 10.1 million new paid customers in the second quarter, beating Wall Street’s average estimate of 8.27 million. And the company finished the second quarter with almost 193 million subscribers.

Netflix warned in April that its growth would slow in the coming months, but investors were hoping to be surprised. They bid up the company’s shares to record highs in recently. The stock is up more than 60 per cent for the year, vaulting Netflix’s market value past the likes of Walt Disney.