Netflix Will Beat Expectations Tonight

Well, now I've done it. Put my short-term (two-hour!) prediction out there for everyone to read. I just hope it doesn't come back to haunt me.

But I don't think it will.

Netflix (Nasdaq: NFLX  ) reports second-quarter earnings this evening. The consensus predictions are for $0.70 earnings per share from $524.4 million in revenue. I think those are going to end up being too low for three reasons.

Under-promise and over-deliver: At the end of 2009, Netflix estimated that it would end the first quarter with 13.5 million to 13.8 million subscribers. It actually ended the first quarter with 14 million. It then predicted it would end Q2 with between 14.7 million and 15 million. Given that it launched streaming to the Wii this last quarter, I think that's also going to end up being too low and that means analysts' models for revenue and earnings will be short of what will be announced.

Analysts under-expect: Netflix has beat consensus estimates for the past eight quarters in a row and 11 of the past 12 quarters. The $0.70 EPS expectation is 29.6% above last year's $0.54 performance. For the past 12 quarters, Netflix has been growing EPS year-over-year by an average of 44.2% per quarter. The last three Q2s averaged 32.1%.

Not as disadvantaged as believed: Yes, I know this goes against what many say. But here's where I'm coming from. Netflix is an all-you-can eat buffet of TV and movie content for a single monthly payment, via both physical DVDs and streaming. Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN  ) has content for download, but it's a single-pay model where you pay for each movie to rent it for a short period of time or to buy it. Do two or three of those in a month and you've matched Netflix's subscription price.

Coinstar's (Nasdaq: CSTR  ) Redbox kiosks are fine for impulse rentals while you're out and about, but the $1-per-day fee can add up if you don't return the disk quickly (which requires another trip in your car). Netflix lets you keep the disk as long as you want (I kept three for two weeks this month). There's talk that Coinstar will begin a streaming service, but I'll believe it when I see it. (Not that it won't happen, but Netflix could end up plowing it under as it did Blockbuster's streaming service.)

Further, Hulu streams over the Internet and has launched a subscription service, but there are still advertisements interrupting the content. I've written before that I think Hulu's owners, Disney (NYSE: DIS  ) , General Electric (NYSE: GE  ) , and News Corp. (NYSE: NWS  ) , may be too late with their subscription service.

All these alternatives are out there, but I believe enough people recognize the value that Netflix represents to sign up for the service. That doesn't mean they don't view video in other ways, just that Netflix is a popular choice.

Where could I be wrong?
It all comes down to subscription growth and average revenue per user (ARPU) for this company. If subscription growth comes in below or at the low end of Netflix's guidance, that would mean lower than expected revenue. The situation is complicated by falling ARPU. For Q1, it was $12.90 per month, down from $13.63 the year before. As streaming has become more popular, the new subscribers are preferentially signing up for the $8.99-per-month level, the lowest at which unlimited streaming is available, which drives ARPU down. Too big a drop and revenue may not grow as much as expected, despite healthy growth in subscriber count.

However, for this quarter, given that the company launched streaming for the Wii this past quarter and the service is a great value, I still believe that it'll beat on earnings and probably beat on revenue. People just consistently underestimate what it can do, same as for many other great growth stories.