New York, May 16, 2026, 07:38 (EDT)
Netflix closed Friday at $87.02, little changed, logging a slight uptick while most of the market dropped. Investors will weigh Netflix’s ad strategy over the weekend, with the stock still trading far below where it stood last month. Nasdaq is shut on weekends, and regular U.S. trading is Monday through Friday, 9:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Eastern.
Netflix pushes reach as it courts advertisers at New York upfront
Netflix spent the week pitching its scale to advertisers. At the New York upfront, the platform claimed its ad-supported service now has over 250 million global monthly active viewers, using an ad-reach metric and not paid subscriptions. According to Netflix, more than 80% of ad-plan users watch weekly. The company said it will take the ad tier to 15 more countries in 2027.
Netflix shares didn’t break out. According to Investing.com, the stock finished at $87.49 on May 8 and ended the May 15 session at $87.02. Shares moved between $85.10 and $89.49 over the week, closing down around 0.5%.
Stocks fell across the board on Friday. The S&P 500 lost 1.2%, the Dow dropped 1.1%, and the Nasdaq composite was down 1.5%. Higher oil prices raised inflation fears and drove bond yields up. Higher Treasury yields tend to hit growth stocks. A Treasury yield is how much investors want to hold U.S. government debt.
Netflix said it’s moving past advertising as an experiment. Amy Reinhard, president of advertising, said Netflix is “ready to compete with anyone.” The company introduced programmatic tools for ads during pauses, live programming and targeted campaigns, using Amazon and Yahoo demand-side platforms. Netflix About
Some analysts were on board. TD Cowen’s John Blackledge said Netflix’s ad-tier monthly active viewers climbed from 190 million in November to 250 million. Blackledge kept his Buy rating and $112 price target. Price targets are 12-month forecasts, not guarantees.
JPMorgan’s Doug Anmuth kept a constructive stance and gave Netflix a $118 price target, pointing to the company’s reach, content plans and progress on ad tech. The average target for Netflix is at $115.89 according to TipRanks, which suggests potential upside of more than 33% from where shares are trading now.
Raymond James analyst Andrew Marok stuck with a Hold rating after the upfront. He said there are still questions about Netflix’s long-term user engagement and the timing for ad revenue to show in earnings. If viewers push back on ads or advertisers are slow to move budgets, Marok said the ad business might not support the stock soon enough.
Omdia said Google, Amazon and Netflix are set to grab around half of global connected-TV ad sales by 2030, with Netflix’s share projected at 9%, trailing Google and Amazon. “The battle for the living room is no longer only about streaming content,” Maria Rua Aguete at Omdia said. Broadband TV News
Amazon is taking a different approach to the same market. At its upfront, Amazon said it reaches more than 300 million ad-supported users in the U.S. across sports, streaming, podcasts, creators and commerce. That scale puts Netflix’s ad strategy squarely in focus for investors.
Traders are still wary. In April, Netflix shares dropped on a soft outlook and word that co-founder Reed Hastings was stepping down as chairman. Reuters said Netflix later cleared a $25 billion share buyback, after it pulled out of talks for Warner Bros Discovery assets.
Netflix has a simple setup for Monday—if Nasdaq steadies and bond yields stay low, the stock could push back toward Friday’s $89.49 high. If risk-off returns, this week’s $85.10 low is back in play. The bigger picture is still more bullish on Wall Street than in the chart, but it boils down to one thing: Netflix needs ad growth to outpace worries about engagement.
