What happened
This has been a bruising year for investors, and the market sell-off picked up steam to start the week, with all major indexes down more than 2% as of 12:03 p.m. ET on Monday. Once again, the culprit is rising fears over the Federal Reserve's plan to raise interest rates to bring a halt to inflation.
The worries over inflation, the direction of the economy, and slowing revenue growth have hit highly valued entertainment platforms hard. Roku (ROKU +4.99%) was trading down 9.6%, while Netflix (NFLX +1.69%) was down 5.7% and Genius Brands International (GNUS +0.58%) was down 2.8%.
NASDAQ: ROKU
Key Data Points
So what
Investors should always remember that most of the daily trading volume in the stock market is driven by institutional firms, and these investors have different goals than the small investor trying to save for retirement.
Streaming stocks are still great places to park some money for the long term. One tailwind in their favor are the households that continue to cancel their cable subscriptions.
Wells Fargo analysts recently estimated that there will be 701 million people subscribing to at least one subscription service by the end of 2022, and that will increase to 808 million next year. That adds up to a buying opportunity for patient investors.
NASDAQ: NFLX
Key Data Points
Now what
Netflix has dropped 71% year to date, while Roku is down 67% and entertainment distributor Genius Brands is down 20%. The market is scared to death of Netflix after it posted a subscriber loss in the first quarter. But I firmly believe the company's wide selection of content and large content budget will continue to win over a lion's share of streaming subscribers over the long term. Netflix can return to growth, so investors should keep it on their radar.
Roku could see revenue come under pressure this year, since a recession in the economy would cause advertisers to hold back on spending. But with traditional TV gradually shifting to digital services, there is a lot of media spending that has to go somewhere. Roku has the technology and growing audience reach to absorb a healthy share of the $60 billion spent on TV advertising every year.
Genius Brands also seems to have a promising future. It is a global content and management company that distributes content on TV and streaming platforms, including Nickelodeon and Netflix. It just recently signed a 20-year deal with Marvel Entertainment that gives Walt Disney the right to use the name and likeness of Stan Lee, the famous creator of iconic superheroes Spider-Man, Iron Man, and the X-Men, among others.
These stocks could be great values, but the major indexes don't appear to have hit bottom yet. Until the markets stop hitting new lows, the weakest growth stocks will continue to fall, too.
