Disney's Claims of Growing Hulu Losses Seen as Potentially Bad for Legacy MVPDs

Disney's increasing its estimate for Hulu losses this year to $250 million could indicate expectations of the virtual MVPD service gaining a million incremental subscribers, which would help Disney subscriber trends but potentially hurt legacy MVPDs, Barclays analyst Kannan Venkateshwar wrote investors Wednesday. Disney has begun the process of seeking regulatory OK for its Fox purchase in numerous jurisdictions worldwide, Disney CEO Bob Iger said on the company's quarterly earnings call Tuesday. Iger said the deal gives it "significant production capabilities and ... the talent to produce on our behalf." He said those production capabilities would be used in Disney's movie and TV businesses and in creating content for its direct-to-consumer offerings. He said an ESPN direct-to-consumer service will launch this spring in conjunction with a "reconceived and redesigned" ESPN app that will allow livestreaming of all ESPN networks and the ESPN+ subscription service. He said the ESPN+ streaming service will be $4.99 monthly, with the Disney direct to consumer service targeted for late 2019. He said the media company is seeing a trend of cord-nevers "coming into ... the multichannel world," attracted by the lower prices and skinnier bundles of digital platforms.