WWE's stock at presstime today is down 5.6% after it yesterday "shot up" 19.3% following the company's announcement that its OTT network "had enlisted 1 million subscribers," according to Richard Morgan of the N.Y. POST. The milestone was "reached within a year" of WWE Network's launch last Feb. 24. The net since Q3 "has added 269,000 subscribers" -- an increase of 37% -- and WWE "attributed the increase to promoting its WWE Network via a free trial, expanding into the UK and adding its Royal Rumble pay-per-view event to the lineup offered by the $9.99-a-month network." Yesterday’s announcement "not only reverses the perception that WWE Network has lost its grip but also counters an offensive mounted" by fans upset at Sunday's Royal Rumble. The elimination of wrestler Daniel Bryan from the event caused critics to take "to Twitter, where they tweeted #CancelWWENetwork with such frequency that the hashtag campaign started trending as one of the social network’s hottest topics" (N.Y. POST, 1/28). MASHABLE's Jason Abbruzzese noted even with yesterday's jump, WWE stock is "down almost 44%" in the past year. The growth of WWE Network has caused "some optimism among investors, and the streaming service could eventually be looked at as successful if it can continue to build its subscriber base." However, the stock is "still well below the level it was [at] upon introduction of the WWE Network, a good indicator" that the launch of the OTT service "was not handled particularly well" (MASHABLE.com, 1/27).
