Disney held its Earnings Call and released its Earnings Report for the fourth quarter of fiscal year 2024. These reports outline how the company is doing financially and usually indicate how the company plans on moving forward. This report was no exception. There were no blockbuster announcements like we had during D23 and D23 Brazil. However the report contains a lot of great insights and info. I will only be looking at Disney+ and Theme parks in this post. So let’s dig in.

Overall Financial Results

First, let’s look at the Disney as a whole. Disney CEO Bob Iger stated, “This was a pivotal and successful year for the Walt Disney Company, we have emerged from a period of considerable challenges and disruption well positioned for growth and optimistic about our future.” It sure sounds like Iger thinks he has succeeded in righting the ship. Here are the companies results:

• Revenues for the quarter: $22.6 billion, up 6% from prior-year quarter
• Diluted earnings per share: $0.25, up 79% from prior-year quarter
• Diluted earnings per share, excluding certain items: $1.14, up 39% from prior-year quarter

Sure sounds like Disney is becoming the money machine that it was in the olden days. Lets look a bit deeper.

Disney +

Let’s just start with a division that has had Iger’s full attention. Direct to Consumer Disney +. Iger mission in life was to make Disney+ profitable. It made money for the first time last quarter and in this report, it had a great quarter with revenues increasing by 15%. Disney attributes this partially to higher effective rates due to increases in pricing and lowering costs. It will be interesting to watch the subscriber and revenue numbers if Disney keeps raising the prices. For now the market has reacted favorably to changes happening at Disney+.

Theme Parks

This is the area that I am most interested. Disney has been raising the prices on all things associated with Theme Parks for years. It seemed that Disney could do no wrong here from taking away free perks like FastPass to raising prices on tickets and all things in the parks. The parks were still very crowded. Unfortunately, not much money flowed back into the parks as many of the attractions and the parks themselves are showing a lot of wear and tear. Seems like this approach has finally had a predictable outcome. Park attendance is down. From the report the Experiences segment had “record revenue and operating income for the full year.” During Q4, Experiences revenue increased by $0.1 billion, or 1%, and operating income of $1.7 billion was a decline of $0.1 billion, or 6% compared to the prior-year quarter. So a record, but flat as compared to other divisions.

In the third quarter report, Disney stated: there were several factors at play including the stress felt by the lower-income consumer and the fact that higher-income consumers are traveling internationally a little more. Disney warned that there would be a continuation of those trends. And the trend continues. So Disney knows that it has priced most people out of the parks. I guess to them that is ok since the parks cannot take many more visitors anyway as they are at capacity. Which means the only way to grow is to squeeze more money out of every visitor. Which they have done.

My Thoughts

The Theme parks need a lot of love. Rides break down much more than in the past. The buildings, railings, walkways, etc are looking pretty shabby. We have too few attractions for the amount of people that are present. Prices are very high for mediocre at best food. Entertainment is curtailed or cancelled. And still pricing keeps going up.

Wow, what a Debbie Downer I have become. Fear not, I am very optimistic. There was a lot of news at the recent D23 conventions about park expansion. Disney itself admits that only upper income families can afford the parks and that it is effecting the bottom line. There is a lot of competition for consumer dollars with Universal’s new land coming on line. So what do I think will happen?

At the recent D23 Brazil convention, most of what was announced for the parks at D23 was reinforced. We now have a better look at the new park offerings. We have also seen progress on the construction of these new lands and attractions. Permits have been filed, Dirt is being moved. Iger seems to have success at making Disney+ profitable, so I think he will turn more attention to the Parks. Do I think we will see lower prices over all. No. Like taxes, once raised, prices almost never fall. Do I think we will see more incentives? Yes. Already there have been special ticket deals, specially priced vacation packages and the return of Disney Dining. I think that trend will continue.

What do you think? Please let me know In the comments. A like is always appreciated.