Disney’s Q1 FY21 Earnings Results Webcast - February 11, 2021

[GoofGoof]

Pfizer and Moderna just this week confirmed 400M doses by end of May. Enough for 200M people. JnJ confirmed they have ramped up production and will meet their target of 100M doses by the end of June. One of their board members said maybe as early as April for the doses. Even if they only deliver half the doses by the end of May (that’s a very conservative estimate) that’s enough doses to vaccinate 250M Americans delivered by the end of May between the 3 companies. That’s 75% of the total American population and 90% of the 12+ population (assuming kids 12-15 are approved by May). So if the manufacturers reach their targets then every American who wants a vaccine will have access to at least their first shot by the end of May. It’s likely that if 20-50M of those people were vaccinated in May with Pfizer or Moderna they will have to wait until some time in June for their second shots, but by the end of June we would still be mostly done. Again, assuming they hit production targets.

Cases will also begin to drop well before we have 200M people vaccinated. There’s no reason to believe that it will take months after that to see any impact. For Disney and the parks it’s anyone’s guess when each of the restrictions is removed, but there’s a pretty good chance we see relaxing starting in the Spring and continuing through Summer. It’s possible that if cases drop fast enough most of the Covid restrictions are gone sometime this Summer. If enough people don’t get the vaccine then it could drag on into the Fall.

 

[havoc315]

Thanks for that info.

However, with these rosy April predictions by Fauci, why does it seem you think that things won't normalize until a few month later in the summer?

1. You’re confusing the timing where healthy young people can start signing up for vaccine appointments for when they can actually get both doses, and they become effective. It’s been pretty consistent that “by April, there will be enough vaccine for healthy young people to sign up”... but they may still be signing up for May/June 1st dose appointments... June/July 2nd dose.. August effectiveness..

2. Recent growth of variants has raised suspicions that it could push the herd immunity threshold higher. If herd immunity requires 90% vaccination, that could take much much longer than 70% vaccination... leading us to..

3. Level of people willing to quickly get voluntarily vaccinated is still very much a wild card. There is concern that beyond about 50% of the population, it might not be so easy to get people quickly voluntarily vaccinated. Remainder of people may be a mix of “absolutely anti-vaccine” to “I’ll get it eventually but it’s inconvenient, I’ll get around to it” to “I’d like to wait a while longer to make sure it’s safe.”

And here is the thing to remember about WDW... it’s not an agile race car. It’s a massive cruise ship, that can turn only very slowly. So optimistically, maybe we do start to see herd immunity response by June. But if WDW wanted to finish a turn of the ship by June, they’d have to start now.

And there is a very real chance we don’t see real levels of herd immunity until September or later. WDW isn’t going to invest the money into turning the ship, until they know it’s actually safe to make the turn. That’s why Chapek talked about an overlap period.. where we may reach herd immunity but restrictions continue for a while.

Best guess (and purely an educated guess).. WDW will evaluate the situation in April. If vaccination rates are skyrocketing and Covid numbers are plummeting, they start seriously turning the ship. Summer sees more entertainment gradually return, gradual increases in capacity.. and the 50th anniversary in October is pretty “normal.”

If in April... vaccination rates are still slow.. public health professionals are still concerned about another Covid wave... then WDW might still gradually bring back some stuff over the summer, but the major turning of the ship will wait longer.

Right now, 2 months into vaccinations, 5% of the population has completed 2 doses. What will it be by end of April? 15%? 20%? Super optimistically could put it at 25%+

So where are we by end of June?
IF everything goes right with JNJ... and if Pfizer and Moderna increase their production a bit faster... and as long as everyone is willing to get vaccinated— then that could put us at 60-65% by end of June.
But we don’t know how close that will be to herd immunity.

 

[HauntedPirate]

First, to a working class family, WDW was an expensive vacation in 1971. But this is relative. For example, for the price of an All Star Resort room today, you could stay at the Contemporary or the Polynesian in the 1970s up until 1984. In addition, WDW tickets were much more expensive than local amusement parks, even in 1971. But, adjusted for inflation or household income, ticket park tickets were only a fraction of today's prices.

This started to change when Michael Eisner took charge. Eisner and Frank Wells significantly increased WDW prices but after 4 years of double-digit increases beginning in 1984, price increase slowed down appreciably. Relatively speaking, WDW prices held steady under Eisner until what I consider to be the modern era, which started when Paul Pressler was promoted to Parks & Resorts Chairman in 2000.

The short of it is there are 3 basic eras of WDW pricing:

• Those who worked directly for the Disney brothers kept prices relatively low. Many executives in the industry felt they were keeping prices too low, making it difficult to operate amusement parks at a profit through the 1970s and 1980s.
• Eisner instituted 4 years of double-digit price increases but then settled down, keeping prices relatively the same throughout the 1990s.
• Pressler introduced the concept of "whatever the market will bear" to WDW pricing, which is effectively where we are today.

Second, there are several ways to look at the cost of a WDW vacation. I tend to focus on ticket price versus household income. With this in mind, here's a couple of graphs I generated years ago.

The first graph compares WDW ticket prices with median household income as a ratio, starting with a ratio of "1/1" in 1971.

View attachment 532555

The second graph shows how prices accelerated under Bob Iger. Compound that acceleration over the 15 years of Iger's stewardship, and the gap has grown tremendously.

View attachment 532556

I’d love to see a similar graph after Chapek was elevated to head of P&R/PEP. Feels like ticket prices went up even more sharply once he was in charge. I mean, I do have a spreadsheet somewhere but it’s not as good looking as your graphs are.

 

[havoc315]

Pfizer and Moderna just this week confirmed 400M doses by end of May. Enough for 200M people. JnJ confirmed they have ramped up production and will meet their target of 100M doses by the end of June. One of their board members said maybe as early as April for the doses. Even if they only deliver half the doses by the end of May (that’s a very conservative estimate) that’s enough doses to vaccinate 250M Americans delivered by the end of May between the 3 companies. That’s 75% of the total American population and 90% of the 12+ population (assuming kids 12-15 are approved by May). So if the manufacturers reach their targets then every American who wants a vaccine will have access to at least their first shot by the end of May. It’s likely that if 20-50M of those people were vaccinated in May with Pfizer or Moderna they will have to wait until some time in June for their second shots, but by the end of June we would still be mostly done. Again, assuming they hit production targets.

Cases will also begin to drop well before we have 200M people vaccinated. There’s no reason to believe that it will take months after that to see any impact. For Disney and the parks it’s anyone’s guess when each of the restrictions is removed, but there’s a pretty good chance we see relaxing starting in the Spring and continuing through Summer. It’s possible that if cases drop fast enough most of the Covid restrictions are gone sometime this Summer. If enough people don’t get the vaccine then it could drag on into the Fall.

You sound like those who claimed we would have 15-20% vaccinated by the end of February.. when we are actually only at 5% through half of February.

JNJ originally said they’d have 12 million doses by February.. now it’s supposed going to take them until April just to hit the first 12 million. (Though they “expect” to produce more rapidly thereafter).

 

[GoofGoof]

You sound like those who claimed we would have 15-20% vaccinated by the end of February.. when we are actually only at 5% through half of February.

JNJ originally said they’d have 12 million doses by February.. now it’s supposed going to take them until April just to hit the first 12 million. (Though they “expect” to produce more rapidly thereafter).

Honestly, you sound like someone who genuinely wants to see the vaccine rollout fail and this pandemic to continue indefinitely.

I simply laid out the number disclosed by the CEOs of publicly traded companies. They are not my wishes or my hopes and they aren’t promises made by politicians. If these companies fail to make their targets their stock prices will likely suffer so they don’t make projections like this lightly. These are the quantities the companies have said very recently they are still on target to deliver. Any number of manufacturing delays could occur between then and now and nobody is disputing that. Will they hit the targets? Nobody knows. You are assuming they definitely won’t make their numbers and that’s your prerogative.

We also have the potential of manufacturing improvements that will shorten the timeline. Already Pfizer has improved manufacturing from the beginning and Moderna is in the process of increasing the doses per vial which will increase doses delivered. Both companies have moved the date of 200M doses expected to be delivered up from end of June to end of May. If delays were imminent why would they shorten their projected timeline? Makes no sense considering they were not contractually obligated to do it and they would be setting themselves up for failure. We also have AstraZenneca and Novavax approaching potential approval. Both vaccines could be approved in Q2 and further add to the doses available.

On the JnJ vaccine they said they would not have the full 12M doses available when approved next week. They are expected to catch up to their production targets by the end of April. That target was 60M doses by end of April. There is some bad reporting out there around that I’ve seen and a few articles reference only having 12M doses by end of April which is not what the company was trying to say. The CEO also confirmed on their earnings call that they would hit the 100M doses delivered by end of June so even if they only had 12M doses end of April and did half the 88M left in May thats over 50M doses by end of May.

 

[mharrington]

So does Disney not investing as much in their parks from now on mean that they will never again be able to be as quality as they once were? By that, I mean, will they never be as good again?

 

[JoeCamel]

You sound like those who claimed we would have 15-20% vaccinated by the end of February.. when we are actually only at 5% through half of February.

JNJ originally said they’d have 12 million doses by February.. now it’s supposed going to take them until April just to hit the first 12 million. (Though they “expect” to produce more rapidly thereafter).

Honestly, you sound like someone who genuinely wants to see the vaccine rollout fail and this pandemic to continue indefinitely.

I simply laid out the number disclosed by the CEOs of publicly traded companies. They are not my wishes or my hopes and they aren’t promises made by politicians. If these companies fail to make their targets their stock prices will likely suffer so they don’t make projections like this lightly. These are the quantities the companies have said very recently they are still on target to deliver. Any number of manufacturing delays could occur between then and now and nobody is disputing that. Will they hit the targets? Nobody knows. You are assuming they definitely won’t make their numbers and that’s your prerogative.

We also have the potential of manufacturing improvements that will shorten the timeline. Already Pfizer has improved manufacturing from the beginning and Moderna is in the process of increasing the doses per vial which will increase doses delivered. Both companies have moved the date of 200M doses expected to be delivered up from end of June to end of May. If delays were imminent why would they shorten their projected timeline? Makes no sense considering they were not contractually obligated to do it and they would be setting themselves up for failure. We also have AstraZenneca and Novavax approaching potential approval. Both vaccines could be approved in Q2 and further add to the doses available.

On the JnJ vaccine they said they would not have the full 12M doses available when approved next week. They are expected to catch up to their production targets by the end of April. That target was 60M doses by end of April. There is some bad reporting out there around that I’ve seen and a few articles reference only having 12M doses by end of April which is not what the company was trying to say. The CEO also confirmed on their earnings call that they would hit the 100M doses delivered by end of June so even if they only had 12M doses end of April and did half the 88M left in May thats over 50M doses by end of May.

Y'all going back and forth over a few months. It is amazing that we might get 300M people vaccinated in as little time as it has taken. This saved thousands of lives any way you dice the numbers.
I'm not sure if it is to make a point or be right on the internet.

BTW - this is an earnings thread, I get that normal equals money but that is a stretch to tie it to an earnings call.

 

[havoc315]

Honestly, you sound like someone who genuinely wants to see the vaccine rollout fail and this pandemic to continue indefinitely.

I simply laid out the number disclosed by the CEOs of publicly traded companies. They are not my wishes or my hopes and they aren’t promises made by politicians. If these companies fail to make their targets their stock prices will likely suffer so they don’t make projections like this lightly. These are the quantities the companies have said very recently they are still on target to deliver. Any number of manufacturing delays could occur between then and now and nobody is disputing that. Will they hit the targets? Nobody knows. You are assuming they definitely won’t make their numbers and that’s your prerogative.

We also have the potential of manufacturing improvements that will shorten the timeline. Already Pfizer has improved manufacturing from the beginning and Moderna is in the process of increasing the doses per vial which will increase doses delivered. Both companies have moved the date of 200M doses expected to be delivered up from end of June to end of May. If delays were imminent why would they shorten their projected timeline? Makes no sense considering they were not contractually obligated to do it and they would be setting themselves up for failure. We also have AstraZenneca and Novavax approaching potential approval. Both vaccines could be approved in Q2 and further add to the doses available.

On the JnJ vaccine they said they would not have the full 12M doses available when approved next week. They are expected to catch up to their production targets by the end of April. That target was 60M doses by end of April. There is some bad reporting out there around that I’ve seen and a few articles reference only having 12M doses by end of April which is not what the company was trying to say. The CEO also confirmed on their earnings call that they would hit the 100M doses delivered by end of June so even if they only had 12M doses end of April and did half the 88M left in May thats over 50M doses by end of May.

That’s truly absurd. Not only do I want the vaccination rollout to succeed, I’m relatively optimistic.
But I also follow the experts and public health officials. None of which believe we will be able to lift the restrictions on larger gatherings before the fall or winter.

Throughout, we have had deniers who claimed that the end was right around the corner. It would all be over by Easter 2020 etc. Throughout, the experts have correctly warned that we had to prepare for the long haul. Now, most experts are hopeful we can start to return to normal by the fall.

Fauci:

Fauci predicts normal life won’t return in U.S. before fall 2021

The assessment comes as the Trump administration appears poised to miss its year-end target to vaccinate 20 million Americans.

www.google.com

 

[dreday3]

That’s truly absurd. Not only do I want the vaccination rollout to succeed, I’m relatively optimistic.
But I also follow the experts and public health officials. None of which believe we will be able to lift the restrictions on larger gatherings before the fall or winter.

Throughout, we have had deniers who claimed that the end was right around the corner. It would all be over by Easter 2020 etc. Throughout, the experts have correctly warned that we had to prepare for the long haul. Now, most experts are hopeful we can start to return to normal by the fall.

Fauci:

Fauci predicts normal life won’t return in U.S. before fall 2021

The assessment comes as the Trump administration appears poised to miss its year-end target to vaccinate 20 million Americans.

www.google.com

That Fauci quote is from December...

 

[havoc315]

That Fauci quote is from December...

And we’re behind the December vaccination schedule. More recent statements have been even more pessimistic.

These are all February:

Redirect Notice

Dr. Fauci Says These 3 Things Could Prevent Us From Returning to Normal

Looking forward to getting your life back, post-pandemic? Fauci warns that these three things could prevent us from returning to normal.

bestlifeonline.com

COVID-19 is the leading cause of death in the United States, but an extraordinary year of vaccine science offers hope that the country can return to something resembling normal life by the end of 2021, said Anthony Fauci in a plenary address at the AAAS Annual Meeting.

Looking Back (and Forward) on COVID-19 with Anthony Fauci

An extraordinary year of vaccine science offers hope that the U.S. can return to something resembling normal life by the end of 2021, said Fauci at the AAAS Annual Meeting.

www.aaas.org

 

[havoc315]

Y'all going back and forth over a few months. It is amazing that we might get 300M people vaccinated in as little time as it has taken. This saved thousands of lives any way you dice the numbers.
I'm not sure if it is to make a point or be right on the internet.

BTW - this is an earnings thread, I get that normal equals money but that is a stretch to tie it to an earnings call.

Actually, this whole discussion is about the earnings call and what Bob Chapek said at the earnings call.

But it might be wise to refocus the discussion: Chapek's exact words (which are open to a bit of interpretation):

We have no doubt that when we reopen up in parks that were closed or increase the capacity that we'll have some level of social distancing and mask wearing for the remainder of this year. That's our expectation.

But I believe that Dr. Fauci said earlier today that, he hopes that there's vaccines for everyone who wants them by April this year. If that happens that is a game changer. And that could accelerate our expectations and give people the confidence that they need to come back to the parks. Will there be some overlap until we know that we've hit herd immunity? Sure there will. But do we also believe that we'll be in the same state of 6-foot social distancing and mask wearing in '22? Absolutely not

So some aspects that are clear and not clear:
Clear: "no doubt" that "some level" of social distancing and mask wearing for the remainder of the year.

Unclear: Yes = fiscal year (though October 1, 2021) or calendar year (Dec 31, 2021)

Clear: Won't be in "same state" of social distancing and mask wearing in 2022.

Unclear" rapid vaccination will "accelerate our expectations."

So unpacking it: There will be "some level" of social distancing and mask wearing through AT LEAST the end of September 2021. Further, there is a good chance we still have "some" social distancing and mask wearing in 2022 -- Just not the "same state." I read all that to mean things will be closer to the abnormal side through the end of 2021, and closer to the normal side by 2022. But not that all social distancing and masking will be gone by early 2022, and not that all current restrictions will be in place at the end of 2021.

His talk of "accelerating expectations" does not suggest to me that mask wearing or social distancing will be gone any sooner than the fall. Just that, if everything goes right, they might *start* to relax those things sooner rather than later. The gradual timeline could get advanced by a month or 2. Maybe they bring back fireworks in July instead of September... maybe they bring back more entertainment in September instead of November...

I wouldn't look at "accelerating our expectations" as suddenly we will get back to normal in April. Nothing about the vaccine rollout has dramatically changed since the earnings call. As of the earnings call, the "no doubt" expectation was that masking AND social distancing would be in place for the "remainder" of the year. There hasn't been a massive increase in vaccination rates in the 5 days since the earnings call... so I don't think anyone can assume that there has been any major change in the "no doubt" expectation.

 

[rogerrabbitfan9]

As a long term investor, I’m not sure how relevant this years theme park numbers are going to be in determining how theme park demand will look long term. I think demand is going to too noisy between pent up demand and the lead/lag between when an individual gets a vaccine and when they are going to be willing to book/go on a Disney trip.

 

[GoofGoof]

That’s truly absurd. Not only do I want the vaccination rollout to succeed, I’m relatively optimistic.
But I also follow the experts and public health officials. None of which believe we will be able to lift the restrictions on larger gatherings before the fall or winter.

Throughout, we have had deniers who claimed that the end was right around the corner. It would all be over by Easter 2020 etc. Throughout, the experts have correctly warned that we had to prepare for the long haul. Now, most experts are hopeful we can start to return to normal by the fall.

Fauci:

Fauci predicts normal life won’t return in U.S. before fall 2021

The assessment comes as the Trump administration appears poised to miss its year-end target to vaccinate 20 million Americans.

www.google.com

I haven’t seen anyone here arguing that life would return to normal before the Fall. There’s a big difference between nothing changing this summer and a full return to normal. I have said from the start of this discussion we would have a gradual easing of restrictions as cases drop and the vaccine rollout continues. I don’t believe we will need to wait until the Fall to see any changes. I’m not sure how me saying that if the manufacturers meet their targets we will have enough doses for anyone who wants one by end of May into June for 2nd shots has anything to do with being a denier. It’s a basic math equation. I said multiple times that manufacturing delays and/or failure to get enough people to accept the vaccine could delay the process.

As far as WDW goes, they can and will see increased crowds and increased business before there’s a return to full normal.

 

[GoofGoof]

Y'all going back and forth over a few months. It is amazing that we might get 300M people vaccinated in as little time as it has taken. This saved thousands of lives any way you dice the numbers.
I'm not sure if it is to make a point or be right on the internet.

BTW - this is an earnings thread, I get that normal equals money but that is a stretch to tie it to an earnings call.

From the earnings call, talk on the financial prospects of the parks:

Ben Swinburne

Thanks. Good afternoon. Bob can you -- I know visibility is limited, but can you tell us how you think about the parks through the rest of this year? In particular, Christine mentioned strong underlying demand. But do you expect to be able to increase capacity limits and fulfil that demand? And as you do, are there things that you've done on the technology or cost side that can help us think about the ramp back to breakeven?

Bob Chapek

Okay. In terms of the outlook for the parks for the rest of the year and the capacity, it's really going to be determined by the rate of vaccination of the public. That to us seems like the biggest lever that we can have in order to either take the parks that are currently under limited capacity and increase it or open up parks that are currently closed. So that is sort of the gating factor if you will.

As Christine suggested, we have ample demand for our parks. Despite everything that's happening with that pandemic, I think we've made a pretty big impression on our consumer base and prospective guests in terms of the safety measures that we've undertaken at our parks to give assurances to people that they should come in and bring their families. And we're very, very pleased with what we're seeing in terms of future bookings.

In terms of the cost savings and the technical side of things, not only has our industrial engineering team at Walt Disney World and some of our parks like Shanghai across the world figured out ways to have increased capacity with the same safety measures that we've had in place, which has enabled us to increase our, if you will, our attendance. But there we have been able to substantially manage our cost side at the same time to right-size, if you will, our -- not only our fixed cost base, but also our variable cost base to match what's happening.

And I think that's evidenced by what Christine said that all of our parks, regardless of what conditions they're operating under, assuming they are operating, are in positive net contribution side. I would also add you didn't mention this, but I think it's important to add that given those per caps that Christine referenced in terms of the double-digit increase in per caps, this is sort of the ultimate situation where demand has exceeded supply. We've had that -- been fortunate enough to have that situation for the last couple of years and we've learned how to yield this business. And I think this is the ultimate situation where we've got supply greater than demand. So not only working on the cost side, but we're also working on the revenue side. And I think you see some of those results at play at Walt Disney World.

Jason Bazinet

Thanks. I just have a question on parks. Since the vaccine came out last year, the buy side has this soft expectation that anyone that saw a revenue downturn because of COVID will get back to 2019 revenues by 2022, once we have herd immunity and the vaccines distributed. And every once in a while, I read some article that suggests that social distancing will still have to be in place even when herd immunity is around and people will still have to wear masks. So, do you guys have any counsel or insight in terms of how you're thinking about sort of how the parks will operate by the time we get to 2022? And any reason, not to believe that we won't sort of get back to 2019 revenues assuming that the economy is fine and all that?

Bob Chapek

Yes. I won't specifically comment on whether we anticipate getting to 2019 revenues by 2022, but I will tell you what our expectations are in terms of the state of the world by then. We have no doubt that when we reopen up in parks that were closed or increase the capacity that we'll have some level of social distancing and mask wearing for the remainder of this year. That's our expectation.

But I believe that Dr. Fauci said earlier today that, he hopes that there's vaccines for everyone who wants them by April this year. If that happens that is a game changer. And that could accelerate our expectations and give people the confidence that they need to come back to the parks. Will there be some overlap until we know that we've hit herd immunity? Sure there will. But do we also believe that we'll be in the same state of 6-foot social distancing and mask wearing in '22? Absolutely not.

So in the 2 bolded sections Chapek is essentially saying that the outlook for the parks segment for this year (ends 9/30/21) will be determined by the rate of vaccination of the public. He also said that if Fauci is correct and the vaccine will be available for anyone who wants it starting in April that that would be a game changer for the parks and would accelerate their expectations. There were many other questions on Disney+ and other topics as well.

 

[havoc315]

I haven’t seen anyone here arguing that life would return to normal before the Fall. There’s a big difference between nothing changing this summer and a full return to normal. I have said from the start of this discussion we would have a gradual easing of restrictions as cases drop and the vaccine rollout continues. I don’t believe we will need to wait until the Fall to see any changes. I’m not sure how me saying that if the manufacturers meet their targets we will have enough doses for anyone who wants one by end of May into June for 2nd shots has anything to do with being a denier. It’s a basic math equation. I said multiple times that manufacturing delays and/or failure to get enough people to accept the vaccine could delay the process.

As far as WDW goes, they can and will see increased crowds and increased business before there’s a return to full normal.

I'll let my posts stand, and yours stand. I've very clearly said I expect some changes over the summer -- Not nothing changes. I said we may see capacity increase to 40%, maybe even 50%. Some modified entertainment may return. But social distancing, masks, and capacity limits will almost certainly remain over the summer. You have suggested that by the summer, they will mostly eliminate social distancing, that they will allow pre-Covid summer attendance levels, etc;. That they won't cap attendance at 50% or lower, etc.
You have suggested, your exact words, that with an effective vaccine rollout "most of the Covid restrictions are gone sometime this summer"...

So yes, you're the one who said WDW may return to mostly normal before the fall. Which is pretty inconsistent with Chapek WDW statements and actions, which show no signs of removing "most" restrictions by summer, even under the best case scenario.

Yes, I'm very confident that we will see some changes over the summer. But you're the only one I've seen strenuously arguing that "most" of the restrictions may be gone by the summer.

 

[havoc315]

From the earnings call, talk on the financial prospects of the parks:

So in the 2 bolded sections Chapek is essentially saying that the outlook for the parks segment for this year (ends 9/30/21) will be determined by the rate of vaccination of the public. He also said that if Fauci is correct and the vaccine will be available for anyone who wants it starting in April that that would be a game changer for the parks and would accelerate their expectations. There were many other questions on Disney+ and other topics as well.

Ahh, you replace his actual words with wishful thinking. He talked about the "end of the year" but with no clarity if he meant the end of the fiscal year (9/30/21) or calendar year (12/31/2021).

He said there was "no doubt" social distancing AND masking will still be in place through the end of the year.
He did not say vaccine availability in April "would" make Disney accelerate their expectations. That's your wishful thinking. He said it "could" lead Disney to accelerate their expectations.

Basically, all he said was, "no question we are going to have social distancing/masking through the end of 2021, and no doubt we will have less social distancing and masking in 2022. If vaccinations really speed up, we might be able to move up our own timeline a bit."
You're turning that into, "if we stick to the current vaccination timeline, we are going to get rid of motion restrictions by summer!"

Stick to what Chapek actually said, and what WDW is actually doing (not readying most entertainment for return, readying FOTLK for a modified socially distanced summer return, keeping thousands of on-site hotel rooms closed for the summer, etc).

If one were to interpret Chapek's words with your level of spin, one could just as easily say, "full restrictions will be in place for the rest of 2021, but will start to relax in 2022. Maybe, if vaccinations start moving a whole lot faster, maybe WDW eases up on some restrictions a little sooner, a couple months after herd immunity."
Now -- I don't believe that paraphrase is accurate either. It's an overly pessimistic paraphrase of Chapek's comments.

 

[dreday3]

oh my gosh....

 

[GoofGoof]

Ahh, you replace his actual words with wishful thinking. He talked about the "end of the year" but with no clarity if he meant the end of the fiscal year (9/30/21) or calendar year (12/31/2021).

He said there was "no doubt" social distancing AND masking will still be in place through the end of the year.
He did not say vaccine availability in April "would" make Disney accelerate their expectations. That's your wishful thinking. He said it "could" lead Disney to accelerate their expectations.

Basically, all he said was, "no question we are going to have social distancing/masking through the end of 2021, and no doubt we will have less social distancing and masking in 2022. If vaccinations really speed up, we might be able to move up our own timeline a bit."
You're turning that into, "if we stick to the current vaccination timeline, we are going to get rid of motion restrictions by summer!"

Stick to what Chapek actually said, and what WDW is actually doing (not readying most entertainment for return, readying FOTLK for a modified socially distanced summer return, keeping thousands of on-site hotel rooms closed for the summer, etc).

If one were to interpret Chapek's words with your level of spin, one could just as easily say, "full restrictions will be in place for the rest of 2021, but will start to relax in 2022. Maybe, if vaccinations start moving a whole lot faster, maybe WDW eases up on some restrictions a little sooner, a couple months after herd immunity."
Now -- I don't believe that paraphrase is accurate either. It's an overly pessimistic paraphrase of Chapek's comments.

I wasn’t responding to you and I’m not sure why you see the need to attack every post I make. I don’t think anything I’ve said is controversial or inflammatory but I am sorry if I somehow offended you anyway. @JoeCamel said this thread was about the earnings call and I was just pointing out the 2 questions on the earnings call where they talked about the vaccine rollout and its impact on current year earnings. I posted the exact transcript. In any case I’m done with this back and forth so please don’t bother to respond to this telling me how I’m wrong again.

 

[disneycp]

Ahh, you replace his actual words with wishful thinking. He talked about the "end of the year" but with no clarity if he meant the end of the fiscal year (9/30/21) or calendar year (12/31/2021).

He said there was "no doubt" social distancing AND masking will still be in place through the end of the year.
He did not say vaccine availability in April "would" make Disney accelerate their expectations. That's your wishful thinking. He said it "could" lead Disney to accelerate their expectations.

Basically, all he said was, "no question we are going to have social distancing/masking through the end of 2021, and no doubt we will have less social distancing and masking in 2022. If vaccinations really speed up, we might be able to move up our own timeline a bit."
You're turning that into, "if we stick to the current vaccination timeline, we are going to get rid of motion restrictions by summer!"

Stick to what Chapek actually said, and what WDW is actually doing (not readying most entertainment for return, readying FOTLK for a modified socially distanced summer return, keeping thousands of on-site hotel rooms closed for the summer, etc).

If one were to interpret Chapek's words with your level of spin, one could just as easily say, "full restrictions will be in place for the rest of 2021, but will start to relax in 2022. Maybe, if vaccinations start moving a whole lot faster, maybe WDW eases up on some restrictions a little sooner, a couple months after herd immunity."
Now -- I don't believe that paraphrase is accurate either. It's an overly pessimistic paraphrase of Chapek's comments.

can you just stop? Your comments add absolutely nothing of value to this conversation. Thanks.