Netflix believes that high member satisfaction propelled the company to finish 2018 on a high with the quarterly additions being up by 46% and the total number of subscriptions up 25.9% compared with the end of the end of 2017. The increases in membership were the result of the massive non-US expansion that has taken place over the last year with international paid memberships up 40% on an annual basis at the end of Q4 2018 and paid additions in the quarter rising 42% on an annual basis to 7.31 million. In the US, the company ended the year with 58.49 million paid memberships adding 1.534 million in Q4. These represented year-on-year rises of 10.7% and 4% respectively.

The spike in memberships was at the heart of a 35% rise in annual revenue to $16 billion in 2018 and a near doubling in operating profits to $1.6 billion. US streaming revenue in the quarter was $1.996 billion, up 22.45% on a yearly basis while international streaming revenues for Q4 2018 amounted to $2.106 billion up 35.9% compared with the end of Q4 2017.

As Netflix expected, Q4 operating margin dipped to 5.2% vs. 7.5% prior year due to so many titles launching in the quarter. And indeed, new content — the cost of which contributed substantially to the company’s overall debt — was the talk of the industry. In a rare revelation of audience numbers, Netflix stated that for its first four weeks, it estimated that Bird Box from director Susanne Bier and Sandra Bullock was accessed by over 80 million-member households. The company expects high repeat viewing.

Netflix added in its results statementadded in its results statement that it was seeing its original film scored as well as TV with particular mention of r scored with Dump/in', The Christmas Chronicles and Alfonso Cuarón's critically-acclaimed ROMA, Paul Greengrass' 22 July, Tamara Jenkins' Private Life and the Coen brothers' The Ballad of Buster Scruggs .