What happened
Yesterday, AMC Entertainment Holdings (AMC -3.25%) reported data from the weekend's box office results. The company needs the box office to recover in a big way, and this past weekend marked some good progress. Investors took note, and AMC stock jumped almost 4% early Tuesday, before paring those gains. As of 1:30 p.m. EDT, shares of the volatile meme stock were still up 1.6%.
So what
The company said it just set the following post-pandemic reopening records for the Thursday-through-Sunday weekend box office period globally:
- Weekend attendance
- Ticket admission revenue
- Food and beverage sales
The strong weekend results came from the domestic strength of the opening of Venom: Let There Be Carnage, and international success of the latest James Bond movie, No Time to Die.
Image source: Getty Images.
Now what
AMC pointed out that superhero film Venom: Let There Be Carnage opened to a reported $90 million domestically, making it the second-largest October opening in domestic box office history. No Time to Die collected $119 million overseas, and is scheduled to open in the U.S. later this week, to be followed by its debut in Europe.
CEO Adam Aron said in a statement, "A new post-reopening global weekend attendance record of approximately 3.9 million moviegoers is important, as is the fact that this weekend's success is due to two different blockbuster movies." He added that Saturday marked the largest single-day revenue seen in the last 18 months since the start of the pandemic.
AMC's stock can move at the whim of retail traders on social media. Its meme-stock status has driven its recent market cap to almost $20 billion, even while it holds $5.5 billion in debt and the business continues to struggle. But a strong box office weekend is a big first step to at least get the underlying business back on track.
