Motley Fool Hidden Gems Investing - Netflix, Comic-Con, and the Streaming Wars

Episode Date: July 19, 2019

Netflix falls 12% after falling short by a couple million new subscribers. Domino’s same-store sales come in low. Amazon sells more than 175 million items on Prime Day. Blue Apron and eBay both hit ...a 52-week high. And Wall Street’s big banks post their latest results. Emily Flippen, Ron Gross, and Jason Moser analyze those stories and share why they’re keeping an eye on Chipotle, Hasbro, and Boston Beer.  Plus, media & entertainment industry analyst Tim Beyers gives his headline for this year’s San Diego Comic-Con and weighs in on the increasingly competitive video streaming wars.   Thanks to Molekule for supporting our show.  Get $75 off your 1st order at http://www.molekule.com and use the promo code “fool75”. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Starting point is 00:00:00 David Gardner This week's Motley Fool Money is brought to you by Molecule. Molecule is reimagining the future of clean air, starting with the air purifier. You can get $75 off your first order by going to Molecule.com, that's M-O-L-E-K-U-L-E.com, and use the promo code FOOL75. Everybody needs money. That's why they call it money. From Fool Global Headquarters, this is Motley Fool Money. It's the Motley Fool Money radio show.
Starting point is 00:00:37 I'm Chris Hill. Joining me in studio this week, senior analysts Jason Moser, Emily Flippen, and Ron Gross. Good to see you, as always. Hey, good to be here. We're recording this week's show a little early. We've got the latest headlines from Wall Street. We've got a report on this year's San Diego Comic-Con. And as always, we'll give you an inside look at the stocks on our radar.
Starting point is 00:00:54 But we begin with the battle for the living room. Shares of Netflix fell more than 12% Wednesday evening after the company's second quarter report came out, with 2.7 million global subscribers added. That's nice, Jason. That's also a couple million short of Netflix's own guidance. Yeah, that's certainly something that doesn't happen all that often. If you go back to 2016, essentially, it happens once a year where they miss their own projections. To their credit, they typically follow it up with a nice beat the next quarter. I'd say, certainly in this case, they'd better hit that $7 million number here they're forecasting for quarter three or else there could be perhaps
Starting point is 00:01:35 some concerns there as far as how far they can grow the subscriber base. They offered a few different possible reasons for the miss there, possibly pulling forward from a very strong first quarter, possibly some areas where they saw the price increase, there was maybe a little bit of a wane in demand there, possibly content-related too. I think it makes sense to put all of those together. And ultimately, I think from the investor's perspective, it at least goes back to my question now as, how much further can they raise prices? I mean, I'm not looking at Netflix as a, oh, my God, this is the end of Netflix situation. But if you're an investor, you have to ask yourself, how much can they raise prices?
Starting point is 00:02:13 Because now we're talking about how far can they actually grow the subscriber base. I mean, sequentially, North America was essentially flat. That's got to be concerning because that's one of their most lucrative markets. International was good, but clearly not good enough. A lot of questions yet to be answered. One question that was definitely answered, they will not be incorporating advertising into their business model, it sounds like, ever. Yeah. I think the market is relatively negative on Netflix after this report. But we can't forget the landscape at which the second quarter was. Netflix really didn't have any big launches. Meanwhile, the very final season of HBO's Game of Thrones was coming out.
Starting point is 00:02:51 So, it probably wasn't going to be a good quarter for Netflix in general. The fact that they said it was slightly down in places where they had raised prices was concerning. But the fact that it was not only down in places where they had raised prices is maybe a testament to the fact that it was a macro kind of cause of the poor Q2, as opposed to something bigger within the company. So, I think Q3 coming forward, we had a great launch of Stranger Things, they said that was their most watched show ever. So, Q3 will be interesting to see that performance.
Starting point is 00:03:21 For me, it's not only can they raise prices, but can they raise prices while they're losing some of their most popular programming, some of their most popular shows? I know folks who are like, I'm not in love with the content already, and if they just take one or two more things away from me, I might not pay the current price, let alone any future increased price. And I think they're in jeopardy with respect to that. Well, to your point, I certainly don't extrapolate my behavior to everyone else. Well, you should. We did recently downgrade one price grade with the service, because we didn't need to
Starting point is 00:03:54 stream four devices at once, because not everybody in my house really uses it all that much. And talking about price increases, just with the current membership base, a $1 or $2 increase in price sounds like it's not much. When you actually multiply that all out and you see it's maybe $5 billion, that isn't really all that much when you compare it to how much money they have to spend annually on content, which is $15 billion and up. That content doesn't live nearly as long a life anymore because it's all released at once. These are just things you have to keep in mind. In terms of the content, this week, the Emmy nominations came out. Netflix coming in second only to HBO in terms of nominations.
Starting point is 00:04:37 I hear what you're saying, Ron. We do see these reports about The Office and Friends going to other streaming services in the future. But for the moment, anyway, Netflix is one of those companies that is making stuff that is of quality. And paying a lot of money to get it done. Second quarter profits for Domino's Pizza came in higher than expected, but same-store sales in the U.S. were the lowest in seven years. Emily, this is one of those businesses that's been on such a great run for so long. When you look at this quarter, do you think this is a speed bump, or is Domino's slowing down?
Starting point is 00:05:09 A little bit of both. The issue here is not their earnings, as you said, but the cannibalization. Their strategy of fortressing is inevitably going to have cannibalization. That's where they build a lot of Domino's in areas where they already have a strong presence. That's to force the competition out to be the only and the fastest game in town. The fact that it has negatively reacted in terms of their same store sales shows analysts and shows consumers that maybe this strategy is ultimately going to hurt Domino's more than it's going to help. But I do think it's too early to tell in this case, simply because it takes a lot of time for consumers to change their typical eating habits. So, somebody who's
Starting point is 00:05:49 accustomed to going to Uber Eats or Postmates, it's going to take them a while to figure out that, hey, that Domino's right down the street, it can get there 10X as fast as Uber Eats or Postmates. I think that's right. Even with growth slowing, you still saw a 3% increase in same-store sales, the 33rd consecutive increase in same-store sales in the U.S. So, in a vacuum, good numbers, but comparatively, relatively, we're seeing slowing down. I'm not surprised. It's hard for companies, quarter after quarter, year after year, to keep putting up those impressive numbers that they have. I think competition is on their heels. Typically, the competition in the space, not very impressive, Papa John's
Starting point is 00:06:30 or Pizza Hut. Starboard Value is in it, Papa John's, don't sleep on them. They tend to get it done. Even Pizza Hut is changing their menu, putting in $5 value menus, including beer delivery. Things are happening in this industry that Domino's should really be aware of. It's interesting you mentioned the competition. Emily, you and I were talking before we started the show. One of the things Rich Allison, the CEO at Domino's, talked about was the impact of Uber Eats and Grubhub and those types of services. I always think about competition for them in the way that you mentioned, Ron. They're going up against other pizza companies. But to your point, Emily, and to the point Rich Allison made,
Starting point is 00:07:06 no, in the era of Grubhub, everything is fair game in terms of competition. Yeah, and that's really threatening to Domino's, which has really only ever competed against, say, Chinese food and other pizza companies. But at the same time, you can either see it as a risk or an opportunity. People are more accustomed to ordering food and having it delivered now more than they've ever been. So, they should really take that as an opportunity and run with it. And Domino's has done what they must do, which is improve their technology platforms, improve digital ordering. Otherwise, they would be in deep trouble compared to those new folks.
Starting point is 00:07:38 Shares of eBay hitting a 52-week high this week, as second quarter revenue came in at $2.7 billion. Ron, eBay is selling a lot of stuff. They're also buying back a lot of stock. Yeah. At first glance, it didn't look so exciting, but it actually was pretty good. Revenue was up 2%. Marketplace revenue up 1%. But you had StubHub up 7%, Classified's up 5%. But you really do have to focus on the marketplace revenue, which is the bigger piece of the pie here. Interestingly, though, operating margins were up, which really helped them translate to growth in the bottom line. Earnings per share up 28%. But, as you mentioned, helped by a lot of share buybacks there. If we want to adjust for that, adjusted net income
Starting point is 00:08:23 was up only 10%. So, you see the effects of buybacks there, really, flowing to the diluted EPS line. But still, not too bad, up 10% with margins widening. Their new payments plan being adopted, you'll recall, they went their separate ways with PayPal pretty much over a year ago, I think. But they're having some success with their payment plan, up 24% quarter over quarter. That's nice to see as well. You mentioned how well StubHub and Classifieds are doing in terms of the eBay portfolio. Part of this release was eBay saying, we're looking at these two businesses, and they're very clearly for sale at the right price. For sure. As they have been, actually, for quite some time with no takers yet,
Starting point is 00:09:06 I think we'll eventually see a deal and they'll divest. Yeah. And those businesses are hard businesses to make profitable. We see even at scale companies like Live Nation struggling to keep their positioning in the market. It's a hard business. I'm not surprised at all to see that eBay maybe wants to get rid of them. Earnings season kicks into high gear next week, which means this week we got the latest results from Wall Street's big banks, including Citigroup, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, just to name three. Jason Moser, you host the Industry Focus Financials podcast. I do.
Starting point is 00:09:36 Anything stand out to you? This better be good. Well, I think you could probably lump all of these big banks into the overarching theme of this earnings season really has been share buybacks. On the surface, it was really shaping up to be a challenging quarter due to a couple of reasons. The low interest rate environment makes it a bit difficult for them to make money on their deposits. You look at market volatility, it's been pulling back a little bit on their trade volume. But they've been able to grow their deposit bases a little bit, really, though it was all about share buybacks.
Starting point is 00:10:10 To put some numbers behind that, Citigroup spent $3.5 billion on buybacks. JPMorgan spent $5 billion on repurchases. Wells about $5 billion, too. Bank of America spent $6.5 billion on share repurchases. And remember, they just got the green light to do more. I think that's going to be something that we're going to see play out here for the rest of the year. Honestly, I don't really fault them for doing that. That's always been the argument for owning banks, is they tend to return cash to shareholders in the form of dividends and share buybacks. But you have to at least keep that in mind. When they're reporting increases in earnings per share or book value per share. You have to understand that that share number
Starting point is 00:10:50 oftentimes is coming down because of the buyback. So, they're doing well, I think, in what is a tough environment. At some point, we're rooting for interest rates to tick back up a little bit. I think that'll unlock some profitability in these businesses. But for now, I think they're doing what they need to do. It seemed that the trend was those with more consumer-facing businesses fared well, since on the interest rate side, it was a little bit tough. So, someone like a Wells Fargo, checking and consumer lending businesses were up. Real estate, credit card, automobile lending were all up. I think Citibank has some good consumer-facing revenue streams as well. But folks like a JPMorgan or even
Starting point is 00:11:28 a Goldman, which is focused more on trading and the interest rate environment, didn't fare as well. I think that's fair. Bank of America, you look at the deposit balances, they're up 6%. That was double of what JPMorgan turned in. Chris Hill. Coming up, one group of embattled shareholders got a reprieve, if only for one day. Details coming up. You're listening to Motley Fool Money. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. Chris Hill here in studio with Jason Moser, Emily Flippen, and Ron Gross. Eventful week for Amazon. On Monday and Tuesday, the company held its annual Prime Day event. Yes, this year Prime Day was officially two days. The company said it sold
Starting point is 00:12:10 more than 175 million items, which is more than Amazon sales last November on Black Friday and Cyber Monday. So, great start to the week. On Wednesday, the European Commission announced it has opened an investigation into potential antitrust violations. Emily, I'll start with you. Which is the bigger deal in a long-term sense of these two things? The Prime Day numbers are a much bigger deal than the EU antitrust investigation. If you have not been investigated by the EU yet, you are not one of the cool kids. Amazon is the last big company to be investigated. I would not be surprised if they come out of this with a pretty substantial fine from the EU for the way that they handled their
Starting point is 00:12:49 third-party small seller data. That's not to say they're deserving of it, it's not to say they're undeserving of it, but it is to say it's expected. And I expect more of these regulations, especially in the EU, to continue. But when push comes to shove, the numbers that we saw Amazon pull in on Monday and Tuesday this week have spoken for themselves. They sold $6 billion worth of goods during their launch. As you mentioned, they sold 175 million items, which is up 100 million items compared to last year. That tells you anything about not only the number of people they have on their Prime platform, but the amount of money that people are willing to spend on the platform. All of this being said, there was a nice little
Starting point is 00:13:30 controversy thrown into the mix, where they accidentally mispriced some very expensive $13,000 camera equipment for $100. And they honored it. And they honored it. So, Amazon is not mistake-free. And I think moving forward, we're just going to see continued great Prime numbers. Worth pointing out, however, that Alibaba on Singles Day, the most recent Singles Day, I believe did somewhere in the neighborhood of $30 billion worth of sales. And if you remember correctly, actually, a lot of those Chinese e-commerce companies got killed last Singles Day, because even though the numbers were amazing, they were
Starting point is 00:14:05 lower than projected. Although, Jason, you and I were talking the other day, it is interesting to see how, in just four short years, Amazon has improved their fulfillment. Because the first Prime Day in 2015, it wasn't just mispricing mistakes, they had significant fulfillment problems. Yeah. And I think part of the reason they've been able to do that is because they have grown in such quick fashion their third-party partners. We were looking at Jeff Bezos' letter to shareholders here at the beginning of this year, and in 1999, 3% of third-party sales represented the overall share, and now it's 58%. They've been building these tools in order to support those third-party partners. A lot of that boils down
Starting point is 00:14:51 the pricing, shipping, fulfillment. And so, it's one thing when you're trying to build models and processes to support your business. But when you're building models and processes to support customers, that's when you really got to show up. And I think that's why they've taken it so seriously. On Tuesday, shares of Blue Apron rose as much as 70% after the company announced it is adding Beyond Meat burgers to Blue Apron's meal kits. Ron, you're a value investor at heart. And a chef, kind of, a cook, not a chef. Did your head explode when you saw this? Well, Chris, it's about a quarter-cup hype and five cups of short covering. Adding Beyond Meat is a good idea. There's
Starting point is 00:15:33 nothing wrong with it at all. But they have offered vegetarian plans for some time, so this is not a game-changer or a change to their business model in any way. And it doesn't save their business by any means. Sales have suffered double-digit percentage declines in six consecutive quarters. Their 550,000 active accounts as of March is down 30% from a year ago. The business continues to suffer. I actually don't see that turning. As we've discussed in the past, there are too many of these types of delivery services, food services. The business is too fragmented. Some will go out of business, some will merge. There probably will be one or possibly two left standing when it all shakes out,
Starting point is 00:16:14 and that might be a fine business. As much as you might question Blue Apron's leadership, this move is a genius move by leadership. Because if you can get even a penny of the alternative meat hype, it's a good day for Blue Apron. Although, Ron, what you just said sort of reminds me of a few years ago with 3D printing, where there was all this excitement, and you could take a step back and say, OK, I see the application, I see the demand, I see this eventually getting somewhere, but but it just seems like we're way ahead of ourselves in terms of the alternative meat market. Yes. 3D printing does not have the feel and texture of meat. So, there's the big
Starting point is 00:16:54 difference here. But, look, Beyond Meat's success since going public is unbelievable. And there's certainly, as I often say, 10 or 20 years from now, I think the meat industry as we know it is going to be significantly different than now. So, these folks are on the forefront. I think there's lots of growth ahead. Unfortunately for Blue Apron, it doesn't accrue to them. Back in 1997, Warren Buffett went looking for acquisitions for Berkshire Hathaway, and he found Dairy Queen. He bought Dairy Queen for $585 million, and we're using that fact as a blatant excuse just to talk about this next story. A woman in Georgia called her local Dairy Queen to request a Moana-themed
Starting point is 00:17:34 birthday cake for her daughter. That's Moana from the animated Disney movie of 2016. The the employee at Dairy Queen misheard that and thought the woman was asking for a marijuana-themed cake for her daughter. The result was a cake that was green and white, featuring a large marijuana leaf, a green My Little Pony character with bloodshot eyes that was smoking. Jason, I'm not really sure where My Little Pony comes into all of this, but I got to say, I love this story. I understand Moana. I can hear that. It was 25 years old, so age-appropriate. But I mean, the pictures of this cake, that was a pretty nicely done cake, in all honesty. Yeah, Emily, to Jason's point, the daughter in question, not a child.
Starting point is 00:18:21 This makes it a little bit better, but still pretty awesome. Yes, much less egregious. And I will say, as somebody who co-advises our marijuana portfolio, there's a good chance for my 25th birthday coming up soon that I may be getting myself a marijuana cake. I'm going to make a little note. Let's bring in our man behind the glass, Dan Boyd. Dan, any thoughts on this one? I wanted to ask Jason, since this story took place in Georgia, how much of the accent was
Starting point is 00:18:44 at play here, from the Moana to the marijuana mistake? Let's see here. Moana versus marijuana. I guess the draw could make it a little bit tougher to discern. All right, Jason, Emily, Ron, we'll see you later in the show. Stay right here. You're listening to Motley Fool Money. Quick thanks to Molecule, which is reimagining the future of clean air, starting with the air purifier. Molecule's introduced a breakthrough science that's finally capable of destroying air pollutants at a molecular level. Their technology has been
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Starting point is 00:20:06 Let's get back to the show. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money! I'm Chris Hill. This week, the entertainment capital of America is not Hollywood or Nashville or New York City. It's San Diego, where more than 150,000 people are gathering for Comic-Con 2019. Here to help us make sense of it all is Tim Beyers, media and entertainment analyst for The Motley Fool. He joins me now from Colorado. Tim, thanks for being here. Tim Beyers. Thanks, Chris. Good to be back. This is an enormous event. They have hundreds of breakout sessions, programs, movie screenings,
Starting point is 00:20:42 and obviously a lot of stars from the entertainment industry. What is your headline for this year's Comic-Con? My headline is, this is the year of the woman. There's a lot of empowering stories from Comic-Con that we're going to see on the main stage at the show this year. Probably the biggest two will be Batwoman from what was Warner and is now AT&T. That'll be a spinoff show for The CW, which is a joint venture between Warner Brothers and CBS. And then, the Black Widow movie for the Marvel Universe. The Marvel Universe is transitioning. They've had a blockbuster run, but now we're going to see how the newer third-tier or even second-tier characters, I guess, it depends on your point
Starting point is 00:21:32 of view will carry that universe forward. But there are some very inspiring stories here. And I think by appealing to the female demographic, we're going to see a very interesting show and a lot of new things from the studio that we haven't seen before. This is not the Comic-Con of even a few years ago. And that's a good thing, I think. I want to get to Marvel in a second, but I'm curious because I've seen the preview that the CW put out for the Batwoman series, and it's incredibly well done. I was struck by the fact that this appears to be the latest example of how the people behind the DC universe appear to be very good at creating television shows with The Flash, Green Arrow, etc. This one
Starting point is 00:22:23 looks fantastic. For whatever reason, they're not really able to make that translate to the big screen why do you think that is first of all it's a different creative team this uh the batwoman series is from the same team that that brought us arrow that brought us the flash it's greg berlanti and and his uh varying partners uh for for the cw and so they've created their own universe that lives very you're right it lives very very well on tv although interestingly over the past year the viewership of the flash and arrow and and the rest of that Arrowverse, for lack of a better term, is down fairly significantly, about 20%. So, the viewership isn't what it used to be. In fact, it's getting a little tired.
Starting point is 00:23:06 So, Batwoman is kind of a shot in the arm, taking a different direction and taking a different character who appeals to an entirely different group. the character of Kate Kane as Batwoman, who is an out lesbian, who is an heiress, and sort of exists outside of the universe of Batman himself. In the comics, she shows up when Batman disappears. So, it's a very interesting character. It's a new way to maybe look at the universe. But that hasn't translated to the big screen, because DC hasn't taken those kinds of chances. What's really exciting about the DC universe is on TV. On Saturday, Marvel's going to be hosting a 90-minute panel in Hall H, which is the biggest venue at Comic-Con.
Starting point is 00:24:00 Yes. Huge anticipation now that the latest phase of the Avengers movies has come to an end. I have to say, I've enjoyed them just as a fan of movies. As a Disney shareholder, I've also enjoyed the impact of these movies. And I'm wondering if now, I don't want to say the bar is too high, but it really seems like if you're a Disney shareholder, it's been a great run for the studios, and the bar is certainly higher for them as a business. Yeah. And we may be entering the phase of Disney where you can't rely on the Marvel Cinematic Universe to carry the ball anymore. Now, that's not necessarily a bad thing. Remember that over 23 movies, the average global haul
Starting point is 00:24:45 for a Marvel movie is very close to $1 billion. It's roughly $960 million. That's a huge number. So yes, the bar is very high for Black Widow and lesser titles like Morbius, which is out of the Spider-Man universe, the living vampire. These are characters that the mainstream doesn't really know or identify with very well, so they're going to be introduced. Now, the hook on this one is Black Widow, because Scarlett Johansson has been through the various Avengers movies. She's a known brand. She's a known name. So I think people are genuinely anticipating that movie. And if it's well-written, I think it will do extremely well, because again, it's another example of a great female hero stepping into a very interesting role with a really interesting background.
Starting point is 00:25:33 I think it can be a great movie, probably on the order of Black Panther, which did about $1.3 billion. But that's going to be the exception rather than the rule. For Disney, really, I think the next phase is the live action of those classic animated movies, The Lion King, Aladdin. The one that looks really good to me is Mulan. I think each of these has an opportunity to be the next stage of Disney, where you're going to see those billion-dollar box offices. So, I don't think the run is over. I just think Captain America has gotten to the finish line and handed the ball off to Mulan, and now we'll see how far she takes it. But I do think it's still a good period for Disney. It's just the Marvel Cinematic
Starting point is 00:26:19 universe isn't going to be what drives profit from here on, at least not in the short term. We'll see how well the characters and the universe get its legs underneath for this next phase. It's interesting that you mentioned the live action remakes, because it wasn't too long ago that Disney was making these one-off Star Wars stories with Rogue One and then Solo. And Solo was seen as something of a disappointment to the point where the company came out and said, we're pumping the brakes on these. You look at a live-action remake of Dumbo, which didn't really do all that well financially. Lion King opens this weekend. The early buzz is not amazing. I don't know, it almost wouldn't surprise me if after Mulan, Disney decided to
Starting point is 00:27:08 also pump the brakes on the live-action remakes. I think you could be right about that. Although, I will say that if history is any guide here, and it usually is, the first few in the Marvel Cinematic Universe weren't spectacular hits. We had Hulk, for example. First of all, it wasn't a great movie, but it also wasn't a blockbuster financially. There were plenty of movies like that. Folks may or may not remember Nicolas Cage's Ghost Rider. You might like that, but it didn't really do well in the overall scheme of Marvel movies. That didn't really happen until 2008 when Iron Man broke out and Marvel took creative control of its movies. This is a relatively new experiment. I expect to see some failures. I do expect
Starting point is 00:28:03 to see some of these stories really catch on and then Disney to figure out the formula. They really did figure it out with the later Marvel films. But yeah, you're right, we're in the early stages here, so it's going to be hit or miss for a little while. Let's get to the streaming businesses, because that's really where all of this content is going to end up. When you look at Netflix, Apple TV+, coming online later this year, same with the launch of Disney+. It seems like we're at a really interesting point for streaming businesses. And just to pick two of them, recently, you have Ted Sarandos, who's the chief content officer at Netflix, telling a group of industry executives,
Starting point is 00:28:51 Netflix needs to be a little bit more cost-effective with its programming going forward. And then, along with that, The Wall Street Journal reporting that Apple is spending somewhere in the neighborhood of $15 million an episode for a new hour-long drama for their Apple TV Plus service. With all of that as background, what is the most interesting thing to you to watch in the streaming services over the next, say, six to 12 months? Because we're going to know a lot more a year from now than we do today. We are going to know a lot more. And money, this is the thing about it, in my point of view, The bigger budgets don't necessarily make the better programming.
Starting point is 00:29:36 And we know that, especially on the Netflix scale, because the biggest budget for Netflix for a while there was House of Cards. And House of Cards was a success, but it tailed off. Some of that is due to controversy around the show, but also, it just got a little tired, it got a little long in the tooth, and people weren't willing to stick with it over the the long haul, which is a little bit too bad, but that's fairly typical. So I think Netflix is right to be pumping the brakes and looking at shorter duration shows, shorter runs, one-offs, and maybe even some shorter programming overall. One of the most interesting experiments that I'm seeing,
Starting point is 00:30:22 and it actually happens to be at the main stage at Comic-Con this year, is a program called Chris, you and I are roughly the same age. So this reference is going to work for you. I think is Cobra Kai. Remember the Cobra Kai? Absolutely. Okay. So Cobra Kai is a YouTube series and it's doing incredibly well. And it's just a throwback to the old Karate Kid. This is not a large budget series. We've talked about YouTube before in that shorter form, interesting, get in, get out, provide a meaty morsel, and then don't do too much over the top. Just keep it short and sweet and very short seasons. That's working with Cobra Kai. It has a small audience, but a very loyal audience. It's really caught on. What happens? It gets the main stage at Comic-Con. This is where
Starting point is 00:31:14 we are now. The main stage at Comic-Con doesn't necessarily go to the biggest budget. It goes to the one that has the viral following. Cobra Kai is an example of that. I think Apple's making a mistake here. 15 million per episode doesn't necessarily buy them a viral following. Meanwhile, Sarandos acknowledging that, yes, we have to tighten the belt a little bit, isn't necessarily a bad thing. What it means is that they're going to laser in on different data and try to find those meaty morsels that carry a long way. I know you've been a fan of YouTube's business for a long time. There's certainly been controversy around inappropriate content on YouTube finding its way into kids' videos.
Starting point is 00:32:00 Yes. Two years from now, do you think we've seen reports of YouTube possibly spinning off a separate service just aimed at kids so that they could have better controls around that? Two years from now, do you think YouTube looks methodically different as a business than it does today? I do, only because I think it has to. It's growing too fast. And the ways in which artists do business with YouTube is going to have to change. Now, whether or not that leads to a spinoff of a kid's channel, I'm not entirely sure. They've tried this before, but it certainly does work. I mean, Nickelodeon has started as that kind of service just for kids. Nickelodeon is for kids.
Starting point is 00:32:45 and then you had Nick at Night. There was an entire universe of shows and content that was built around the Nickelodeon brand. Certainly, YouTube could borrow from that in building out its business. But the bigger issue, I think, is that the way that YouTube engages with artists has to change. It's going to have to change fundamentally. The revenue model is changing because there are a lot of open questions like, what happens in terms of royalties? and if a show moves from YouTube onto, say, a network, does that mean that the YouTube creator has to continue to pay YouTube? How do those contracts work? Is it residuals? Is there a syndication type of deal? How does that actually work? And how does ownership work in the YouTube
Starting point is 00:33:35 era? I think those are the bigger questions that artists and the channel itself are going to have to settle. But I think those are very good problems to have. Yes, YouTube will look different in two years, but that's a change in how business is done around content in the era that we're in today, heading into the 2020s. We've talked a lot about media and entertainment. Let's step aside from that for just a second. What is a business out there outside the media and entertainment industry that you're a big fan of, and maybe even from a stock perspective you're bullish on? It's a good question. I'm tempted to go back to the well on Microsoft, but I'm going instead to say Twilio. Twilio is a fantastic
Starting point is 00:34:26 business. I think it's the fourth pillar in the cloud business. If the three pillars that exist today are Amazon, Alphabet, and Microsoft. I think Twilio is No. 4. And I deliberately leave out Facebook there, because I think Facebook has too many regulatory challenges to be considered a cloud titan over the long-term. But Twilio is creating a telecommunications cloud that I think will dominate over the next 10 years, because it's developer first, write software and then that software executes communications apps, like you want to be able to put video in Slack or you want to put it in a different app in Salesforce, Twilio tends to execute that. If you want to put the ability to make calls in an app, if you want to be
Starting point is 00:35:19 able to send a map from your smartphone to a loved one about, hey, here's the route I'm can see in 20 minutes. Twilio does a lot of that execution work, and they do it through software that developers really like. And when developers are on board, it's usually an indicator that there's a lot of wealth and a lot of enthusiasm to come. Developers usually are the early warning system for the multi-bagger to come. And in the case of Twilio, I think they've waited loud and clear. Last thing before I let you go, I know you've gone to Comic-Con in the past, you've been working, but the cosplay is always something that gets attention every year at Comic-Con. If you had to dress up, what are
Starting point is 00:36:09 you dressing up as? What's your costume of choice? Oh, my gosh! The best one I ever saw, I would love to be, if I had the skill to replicate this, I would totally do it. But there was somebody who did, I don't know how how they did it, stilts, pulleys, whatever it was. But I saw at a show one year, somebody who built an entire Galactus costume. And Galactus, the world eater in the Marvel Universe, and he's purportedly something like hundreds upon thousands of feet tall. And this giant costume must have been 15 feet tall. And actually walking through the halls, I thought, first of all, that's amazing. How is that person not falling over? And second of all, how much work
Starting point is 00:36:57 did it take to put that together? I was truly awe-inspired. So if I could pull that off, I would be very proud of myself. Tim Beyers covers media and entertainment for The Motley Fool. Tim, always good talking to you. Same here, Chris. Thanks a lot. Coming up, we'll give you an inside look at the stocks on our radar. This is Motley Fool Money. As always, people on the program may have interest in the stocks they talk about, and The Motley Fool may have formal recommendations for or against, so don't buy or sell stocks based solely on what you hear. Welcome back to Motley Fool Money. Chris
Starting point is 00:37:31 Hill here in studio once again with Jason Moser, Emily Flippen, and Ron Gross. Time to get to the stocks on our radar. Let's keep it quick here, Ron. You're up first. What are you looking at this week? What are you saying, Chris? I've got Hasbro, H-A-S, one of the world's largest makers of toys and games. Nice combination of toys and branded entertainment, performing much better than their largest rival Mattel, especially with the weakness in brick-and-mortar, the bankruptcy of Toys R Us, successfully expanding into digital offerings, online games, raised their dividend for the past 16 years. Dan, question about Hasbro? Yeah, well, of course, as everybody knows, Hasbro owns the Transformers intellectual property.
Starting point is 00:38:08 Ron, do you have a favorite Transformer? Hey, Oedipus Rex? Let's move on. Emily Flippen, what are you looking at this week? I am looking at Chipotle, CMG. They're scheduled to report next week on the 23rd. And I'm excited because they're revamping their menu. They're revamping their technological experience. And if Blue Apron tells us anything, there is a huge opportunity if Chipotle just adds Beyond Meat to the menu. And the ticker symbol?
Starting point is 00:38:36 CMG. Dan, question about Chipotle? Emily, what's your regular Chipotle order? Everything. And a ton of sour cream. The sour cream makes it. I knew I'd hate it. Jason Moser, what are you looking at? You know what goes well with a Chipotle burrito? A Boston beer. That's what I'm taking a look
Starting point is 00:38:53 at. Boston beer, ticker SAM. These guys have really come back from the dead. Full year 2019 depletion numbers estimated between 8% and 13%. The problem is, that's thanks to a lot of success with the seltzers and the angry orchards and the twisted teas. While they are feeling a lot of headwinds with the Samuel Adams brand, what did they do, Chris? they acquired Dogfish Head Brewery, and that should help fill some of the void they have in their IPA catalog. I'm not sure it's going to be enough, but we'll find out. Dan? What's your favorite Sam Adams brew there, Jason?
Starting point is 00:39:23 Well, if I can include Dogfish Head in it now, I'll go with the 120 IPA. That's a killer. Ooh, yes! Nice. Three stocks, Dan. You got one you want to add to your watch list? I've always got a thirst, Chris, so I'm ready to add Boston Beer Company to my watch list. Hey, now! All right, Jason Moser, Ron Gross, Emily Flippen, thanks for being here. Thanks for having us! That's going to do it for this week's edition of Motley Fool Money. Our engineer is Dan Boyd,
Starting point is 00:39:45 our producer is Matt Greer. I'm Chris Hill. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next week.

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