What happened
On the back of a media report that featured some rather encouraging news about its subscriber count, Netflix (NFLX -0.63%) was a popular stock on Hump Day. The video streamer's share price improved by 3.5% as a result, a figure more than sufficient to top the S&P 500 index's 1.1% rise.
So what
On Wednesday morning, Bloomberg published an article highlighting a recent analysis of Netflix's operations by researcher Antenna.
According to Antenna's estimates, roughly 2.6 million people across the U.S. signed up for Netflix accounts in July. That was the highest number among all video streaming services for that period. Of this figure, around 23% consisted of sign-ups for the company's ad-supported subscription plan, a budget option meant to broaden the user base.
Those findings come amid a crackdown by Netflix on password sharing, in which a single account is used by different people.
Netflix management has not yet officially commented on the Bloomberg report.
Now what
One big caveat to the July figure is that it is a more than 25% decline from the June number; however, that jump occurred shortly after Netflix's announcement of the crackdown.
The company is doing a better job than many expected in keeping that all-important subscriber growth alive, and I'd bet it's not only because of the looming demise of password sharing. The service still has plenty of good content, and it has been effective at appealing to various age groups and demographics -- children, documentary lovers, action movie fans, etc. etc.
