As earnings season ramps up, this week includes some big and important names. Two reports wroth watching are electric-car maker Tesla's (TSLA +0.53%) and streaming TV service company Netflix's (NFLX 0.68%). Both consumer-facing businesses will provide investors with key insight into the economy -- and both companies report earnings on Wednesday. Tesla's results and management's respective commentary will help investors see whether or not its aggressive pricing strategy to help offset the negative impact of high interest rates on affordability is working. Further, Netflix's report will provide insight into consumer behavior toward a discretionary but valuable form of entertainment.
Are consumers pulling back more than expected? Or are they resilient headed into the holidays? Tesla and Netflix's reports may give us insight into these timely questions.
NASDAQ: TSLA
Key Data Points
Tesla: Are price cuts working?
Following Tesla's aggressive price cutting this year, its vehicles generally cost around 20% less than they did at the start of the last year. In Tesla's second-quarter earnings call in July, CEO Elon Musk said it generally aims for demand to track production. So price cuts mean that higher interest rates were likely weighing on demand and the company needed to lower prices to get incoming vehicle orders to keep up with its growing production volume.
From what we've seen so far in 2023, aggressive price cuts have been enough to offset the challenges of higher interest rates. Deliveries for the first nine months of the year rose an impressive 46% year over year.
But investors will likely want more recent and detailed insight from management. Investors should look to see if management explains how orders have been trending during the first few weeks of Q4. Is demand still growing sharply year over year? Does the company have enough confidence in its trajectory of vehicle orders to predict strong growth next year, too?
Netflix: Are subscriptions still growing?
Regarding Netflix, investors should look to see whether the company's paid streaming memberships grew nicely in Q3. Growth in this key metric slowed to low single digits year over year earlier this year. Fortunately, however, Netflix's membership growth picked up substantially in Q2. The company's global streaming paid memberships rose 8% year over year to about 238 million. This compared to 4.9% growth in the prior quarter and just 4% growth in the quarter before that.
Looking to Q3, investors should hope for even better growth in Netflix's subscribers. This is because the company didn't finish the broad rollout of its crackdown on free account sharing until Q3. Management said in the company's second-quarter update that it expected the full benefits of its paid account sharing program to be realized in the second half of the year.
So, as long as consumers aren't unexpectedly taking the axe to their Netflix subscriptions, the streaming service should see a further acceleration in the year-over-year growth rate in its paid memberships in Q3.
Investors can tune into both Tesla's and Netflix's third-quarter reports on Wednesday, Oct. 18, after market close.
