Amazon is exploring offer for Peloton, source says; report says Nike also weighing bid | Canada News Media
Connect with us

Business

Amazon is exploring offer for Peloton, source says; report says Nike also weighing bid

Published

 on

Peloton Interactive Inc has drawn interest from potential buyers including e-commerce giant Amazon.com Inc, according to a person familiar with the matter, as the exercise bike maker struggles to maintain pandemic-fueled growth.

Shares of Peloton surged 30% in extended trading on the news, which comes days after activist investor Blackwells Capital urged the company’s board to put it up for sale.

Amazon is exploring an offer for Peloton and is speaking with advisers about whether and how to proceed, a source said. Peloton has not yet decided whether it will explore a sale, according to the source.

Meanwhile, the Financial Times reported https://www.ft.com/content/8ae3240b-8c09-48e4-bc2c-b7a9e4c00c51 late on Friday that sportswear company Nike Inc is also evaluating a bid for Peloton, citing people briefed on the matter, who said the considerations are preliminary and Nike has not held talks with Peloton.

Peloton and Nike did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment, while Amazon declined to comment.

Peloton’s sales boomed during COVID-19 lockdowns, with many snapping up home fitness equipment. But its fortunes began to fade as vaccinations increased, gyms reopened and rivals offered competitive products.

In November, it hinted that demand for its exercise bikes and treadmills was slowing faster than expected, and its market capitalization since then has shrunk to about $8 billion from a peak of nearly $52 billion in early 2021.

If the stock’s gains hold on Monday, Peloton could reach the $10 billion market-capitalization threshold.

Last week, Blackwells Capital called on the board of Peloton to remove CEO John Foley immediately, accusing him of deals that set high fixed costs and for holding on to excessive inventory, while misleading investors about the need to raise capital.

Blackwells criticized Foley for hiring his wife as a key executive and committing to a 300,000-square-foot, 20-year lease for office space in New York, among other things.

The investment firm, run by Jason Aintabi, has also urged the board to put the company up for sale to a buyer like Walt Disney Co, Apple Inc, Sony Group or Nike Inc, Reuters reported on Sunday.

Peloton has tried to cushion the blow to its growth by cutting the price of its popular bike and ramping up its ad spending, but growth remains stagnant.

Last month, Peloton said the company was reviewing the size of its workforce and “resetting” production levels, following a report that it was temporarily halting production of connected fitness bikes and treadmills after a significant drop in demand.

While many investors have become frustrated with Peloton due to a steep drop in its share price, analysts also note that the company may be a difficult acquisition target because of its two classes of stock, effectively allowing insiders to control it.

The news was first reported by the Wall Street Journal. (https://on.wsj.com/3AVMIf7)

The growth in the fitness band market has prompted tech giants such as Apple Inc and Samsung to introduce features for health tracking, including electrocardiogram and blood pressure sensor. Alphabet Inc-owned Google closed its acquisition of fitness tracking company Fitbit Inc in January.

Tech giants including Amazon and Alphabet have also seen a rise in their valuation after blockbuster results this week. A day after Facebook owner Meta Platforms suffered the deepest loss of stock market value in history for a U.S. company, Amazon logged the greatest ever one-day increase in value.

(Reporting by Rithika Krishna, Tiyashi Datta, Nivedita Balu and Shivam Patel in Bengaluru and Greg Roumeliotis in New York; Editing by Devika Syamnath, Peter Henderson, Anil D’Silva and Kim Coghill)

Business

Netflix’s subscriber growth slows as gains from password-sharing crackdown subside

Published

 on

 

Netflix on Thursday reported that its subscriber growth slowed dramatically during the summer, a sign the huge gains from the video-streaming service’s crackdown on freeloading viewers is tapering off.

The 5.1 million subscribers that Netflix added during the July-September period represented a 42% decline from the total gained during the same time last year. Even so, the company’s revenue and profit rose at a faster pace than analysts had projected, according to FactSet Research.

Netflix ended September with 282.7 million worldwide subscribers — far more than any other streaming service.

The Los Gatos, California, company earned $2.36 billion, or $5.40 per share, a 41% increase from the same time last year. Revenue climbed 15% from a year ago to $9.82 billion. Netflix management predicted the company’s revenue will rise at the same 15% year-over-year pace during the October-December period, slightly than better than analysts have been expecting.

The strong financial performance in the past quarter coupled with the upbeat forecast eclipsed any worries about slowing subscriber growth. Netflix’s stock price surged nearly 4% in extended trading after the numbers came out, building upon a more than 40% increase in the company’s shares so far this year.

The past quarter’s subscriber gains were the lowest posted in any three-month period since the beginning of last year. That drop-off indicates Netflix is shifting to a new phase after reaping the benefits from a ban on the once-rampant practice of sharing account passwords that enabled an estimated 100 million people watch its popular service without paying for it.

The crackdown, triggered by a rare loss of subscribers coming out of the pandemic in 2022, helped Netflix add 57 million subscribers from June 2022 through this June — an average of more than 7 million per quarter, while many of its industry rivals have been struggling as households curbed their discretionary spending.

Netflix’s gains also were propelled by a low-priced version of its service that included commercials for the first time in its history. The company still is only getting a small fraction of its revenue from the 2-year-old advertising push, but Netflix is intensifying its focus on that segment of its business to help boost its profits.

In a letter to shareholder, Netflix reiterated previous cautionary notes about its expansion into advertising, though the low-priced option including commercials has become its fastest growing segment.

“We have much more work to do improving our offering for advertisers, which will be a priority over the next few years,” Netflix management wrote in the letter.

As part of its evolution, Netflix has been increasingly supplementing its lineup of scripted TV series and movies with live programming, such as a Labor Day spectacle featuring renowned glutton Joey Chestnut setting a world record for gorging on hot dogs in a showdown with his longtime nemesis Takeru Kobayashi.

Netflix will be trying to attract more viewer during the current quarter with a Nov. 15 fight pitting former heavyweight champion Mike Tyson against Jake Paul, a YouTube sensation turned boxer, and two National Football League games on Christmas Day.

The Canadian Press. All rights reserved.

Source link

Continue Reading

Business

All Magic Spells (TM) : Top Converting Magic Spell eCommerce Store

Published

 on

Product Name: All Magic Spells (TM) : Top Converting Magic Spell eCommerce Store

Click here to get All Magic Spells (TM) : Top Converting Magic Spell eCommerce Store at discounted price while it’s still available…

All orders are protected by SSL encryption – the highest industry standard for online security from trusted vendors.

All Magic Spells (TM) : Top Converting Magic Spell eCommerce Store is backed with a 60 Day No Questions Asked Money Back Guarantee. If within the first 60 days of receipt you are not satisfied with Wake Up Lean™, you can request a refund by sending an email to the address given inside the product and we will immediately refund your entire purchase price, with no questions asked.

(more…)

Continue Reading

Business

CPC Practice Exam

Published

 on

Product Name: CPC Practice Exam

Click here to get CPC Practice Exam at discounted price while it’s still available…

All orders are protected by SSL encryption – the highest industry standard for online security from trusted vendors.

CPC Practice Exam is backed with a 60 Day No Questions Asked Money Back Guarantee. If within the first 60 days of receipt you are not satisfied with Wake Up Lean™, you can request a refund by sending an email to the address given inside the product and we will immediately refund your entire purchase price, with no questions asked.

(more…)

Continue Reading

Trending

Exit mobile version