Nov 11, 2022

Bob Chapek will be fired.

Disney released its fourth quarter earnings this week, and financial analysts were not impressed with CEO Bob Chapek's remarks.

Jim Cramer, host of CNBC's Mad Money, said while appearing on Squawk Box, "[Chapek] should be fired.

"Even what he was good at ...... The loss here is mind-boggling," Kramer claimed. Kramer argued that. [If the football team were to suffer the kind of negative earnings and losses that Disney is currently experiencing, they would not hesitate to remove the coach, and Disney's board should be equally fearless in removing the leader.

I had faith, but there is no doubt in my mind that he must go. That (inning call) was unconscionable. Both the quarter itself and the way he handled it... It was as if it had been a four-star quarter. Delusional.

After Wednesday's conference call, The Walt Disney Company's stock plunged to a two-year low. The closing price that day was $86.75 per share. This is the lowest closing price for Disney stock since March 23, 2020.

The decline was largely due to a weak outlook for the coming year. Disney is forecasting low single-digit growth, while the Wall Street consensus has been for 25% growth so far. Analyst Michael Nathanson writes, "Never before have Disney's profit forecasts been so wrong."

The most unfavorable figure in the earnings release was a $1.47 billion loss for Disney's streaming division, up more than $800 million from the same period last year. Although Disney added more than 12.1 million new accounts to Disney+ (totaling 164.2 million), the company does not expect streaming to be profitable until 2024, and some analysts say even that time frame is too optimistic.

Cramer clearly argued that Chapek should leave, but the fact is that he is a well-known financial analyst and has no real influence over what happens at Disney. At least for now, Chapek still seems to have the support of the Disney board, which gave him a three-year contract extension in June.