In 2025, Netflix notched a net profit of $11 billion on a 16% increase in revenue, to $46.6 billion. It expects revenue growth to cool off this year, projecting an increase of 13%-14%, while the streamer is aiming to boost operating margin by 200 basis points, to 31.5%. It has a healthy balance sheet, with $9.1 billion in cash and equivalents and very manageable total debt of $14.4 billion as of June 30.
So why did Netflix, which is still throwing off a good chunk of change, this week lay off around 1,000 employees — its biggest cutback to date? Companies often make layoffs in crisis mode, such as when they’re facing near-term revenue shortfalls and they simply can’t make payroll. That’s not the case here.
But Netflix faces a festering pain point. Specifically, investors are worried about the slowdown in its U.S./Canada region — which has raised questions about its long-term growth trajectory. For the second quarter of 2026, Netflix’s UCAN revenue decelerated from 14% the prior quarter to 10% (partially due to its recent price hikes).
The company also issued Q3 revenue guidance below analyst expectations. Shares of Netflix are down 20% year-to-date on fears the streamer’s days of double-digit gains are coming to an end. Netflix’s 6% reduction in force and the move to boot chief content officer Bela Bajaria — replacing her with well-regarded industry veteran Peter Rice, who hails from Disney and 21st Century Fox — signal its attempts to get in front of the issue.
Multiple industry sources told Variety they think Bajaria is being made the scapegoat for Netflix’s larger problems. But content is the main engine that powers Netflix’s financials. As Variety’s analysis of Bajaria’s exit noted, Netflix hasn’t produced a “culture-defining hit in the vein of ‘Stranger Things’ in quite some time.” Back to the all-important UCAN region: Total viewing hours in the U.S. and Canada declined in Q2, according to BMO Capital Markets analyst Brian Pitz.
Netflix’s parting ways with Bajaria and hiring Rice “suggest[s] to us that engagement trends may have softened further in 3Q26E,” Pitz said in a research note Friday. The change in content leadership prompted the Wall Street firm to lower revenue estimates for Netflix’s Q3 and Q4 by around 1% each and to also reduce its 2027 revenue forecast by 1.5%. BMO’s model, Pitz added, “conservatively does not assume a UCAN revenue acceleration” until 2029.
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