Disney has been worst hit so far due to the coronavirus pandemic, as releases and production delays reduced the media company’s market cap by one-third last week.
The impact of the coronavirus has been felt by Disney, after the company’s stock crashed and went below the $100 mark, effectively wiping $85bn off its valuation.
Technology major Apple may potentially take advantage of these tough times and acquire Disney, Rosenblatt Securities analyst Bernie McTernan said in a research report.
“We believe those with long-time horizons, like mega-cap companies with large cash balances and whose equity outperformed Disney over the last three weeks, like Apple, could take advantage of the volatility,” McTernan wrote, noting that Disney’s market capitalisation was approximately $165bn, while Apple has about $107bn in cash and securities.
“The upside from acquiring Disney would be securing their content/streaming strategy and potential synergies from adding the emerging Disney ecosystem to the iOS platform,” he added.
McTernan also believes Disney’s new streaming service Disney Plus could bolster Apple’s foray into video streaming. While Disney Plus has been thriving along with streaming giants Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Hulu, AppleTV Plus has not had much impact on that front.
Disney earlier this year said it had signed up 26.5m subscribers to Disney Plus by the end of 2019 and 28.6m as of February 3.
