Netflix (NFLX) Hits 26-Month Low on Weak $0.67 Q4 EPS Outlook

Q4 Guidance Undercuts a Clean Profit Beat

Netflix shares fell to $64.10 in Wednesday trading, their weakest level since August 2024, after the company paired a third-quarter profit beat with a fourth-quarter outlook that missed expectations. Third-quarter earnings per share came in at $0.87, above the $0.82 that analysts had modeled, and revenue climbed 12% to $12.87 billion, in line with forecasts. The reported quarter was not the problem. Guidance was: the company projected fourth-quarter EPS of $0.67, below the consensus of $0.73, and investors sold the stock on the gap between the two numbers. The results landed after Tuesday's close, which made Wednesday the first full session to absorb the new outlook.

Netflix also cut its 2026 advertising revenue target to roughly $2.7 billion from $3 billion. The shareholder letter filed with the SEC attributed the reduction to a slower rollout of advertising features than planned, and it did not attach a revised timeline for the delayed features. Advertising had been positioned as one of the main growth levers for 2026, so the trimmed target landed with nearly the same force as the earnings guide itself. Wednesday's session capped a bruising stretch for the company. Netflix dismissed around 1,000 employees over the past week and replaced the head of its film division alongside its chief creative officer. Co-CEO Ted Sarandos addressed the upheaval during the post-earnings call: “I know that we could do better.” He added that the strategy itself needs no fundamental change, only better execution in the United States. Even before Wednesday, the shares stood about 50% under their mid-2025 record of $134.12, and the softer outlook gave holders one more reason to step aside.

Record Revenue Meets a US Demand Dispute

The sharpest contrast of the quarter sits between the income statement and the chart. Netflix's trailing twelve-month revenue stood near $50 billion as of September, the highest figure in company history, which works out to a 20.4% compound annual growth rate since 2015. The last growth stall ran from early 2022 into mid-2023. Growth then resumed, and the operating margin expanded to 34.6%, up from 28.2% twelve months earlier. That margin profile, built while the equity lost half its value, is what makes the selloff hard to read as a verdict on operations.

The open question is demand in the United States. Antenna, a subscription analytics firm, logged no month of net subscriber growth in the US market through September. Netflix disputes that reading, and says churn both globally and in the US improved year-over-year. The two claims cannot be squared from public data, which leaves investors weighing the company's churn figure against an outside demand estimate. There is also a competitive backdrop to consider, with YouTube and TikTok competing for a larger share of viewing time. What the figures do settle is the direction of the core business: revenue is compounding at a pace few media companies match, and profitability improved while the share price fell by half. The market is not pricing a broken company. It is pricing slower US demand and a delayed ad ramp, and Wednesday's slide was the sound of that repricing.

Two Levels Frame the Rebound

The stock now sits between two closely spaced lines on COINOTAG's composite map. Live data shows NFLX at $65.22, up 0.74% over the past 24 hours, after a range of $63.79 to $67.22 in which sellers drove it to within roughly 0.6% of the strongest support before stepping back. That support, at $63.38, scores 71 out of 100; the nearest resistance, $66.41, scores 74 out of 100 and capped the rebound attempt. Daily RSI reads 32.5, the price sits inside a downtrend with its moving averages sloping lower, and the stock perpetual market carries roughly $9.1 million in open interest with funding near neutral at 0.0239%. A daily close through either line would decide whether Wednesday's low becomes a base or a waypoint.