The earnings call was less then pleasant for all involved.
Disney’s income is officially down 90%. The entire stockholder meeting was spent not answering the stockholders’ questions.
When will Disneyland reopen?
“That has yet to be determined.”
When will Disney World reopen?
“That has yet to be determined.”
When will the cruise ships put to sea?
“That has yet to be determined.”
Will Disney be completing it’s purchase of the three cruise ships currently on order.
“We are going through expenses with a fine-tooth comb.”
Well, that was almost an answer. Where is the money to come from?
“Disney, is a very strong brand with a bright future because we will make money in the future.”
There were no answers given with the exception of, “will we be getting our dividends?”
The answer to that was a very definite, “no!”
According to an insider called WDWPro (who has proven to be reliable in the past), Disney World has a target opening of August. But this is questionable. If Florida makes the guests wear masks there won’t be any point. You are talking about central hot-ass Florida at a time of the year when the temperature is usually in the mid-nineties. And you won’t be able to let people slip into air-conditioned buildings like they usually would. But they do want to open it this year. Possibly one gate at a time. First Magic Kingdom, then Animal Kingdom, followed by Hollywood Studios. And finally EPCOT.
However, there is maintenance going on at WDW. After all it’s in the middle of a Florida swamp so you have to keep things up or they will be impossible to start later. Things rust instantly down there and then the gators move in. So, yeah they have to spend money in Orlando.
Disneyland is in much worse shape. There is no maintenance being performed and everything is powered down completely. According to WDWPro, the whole place is filthy with bird-shit now. And it is absolutely infested with rats. Cast Members that are still working there have to bring their own food and then dispose of it according to regulations. Don’t look for it to open until 2021.
The cruise lines are under the biggest question mark. Disney isn’t committing itself yet but past a certain point it will make more sense just to close out the cruise line division and sell off the ships.
The magic words they kept using were, “pent-up demand.” Apparently that is the switch that is going to be thrown and the money will come pouring back in.
And as bad as this meeting was, the Q3 earnings call is going to be a lot worse.
Stay tuned.
Okay, I’m done here.
The Dark Herald 
Here’s hoping for the Mouse’s downfall.
Slightly off-topic but not (since I dare to hope Mickey’s grip will loosen and beloved IPs might get free) at this point, what would Star Wars have to do to win you back?
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Die
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Have a press conference where they pull a Dallas and show a trailer/clip of Luke waking up in a fever sweat. Brief flashes of some of the moronic scenes from T LJ flicker across the screen. Luke rubs at his eyes as an echo -y force ghost voice quavers: “Happen it will, if find them you do not.”
Then hire John C. Wright to craft the script outline for the “real” movie trilogy.
Easy peasy.
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Seeing as the “pandemic” has turned out to be the equivalent of a moderately bad flu, we should just abandon the masks and pointless social distancing.
But the politicians are too locked into their own narrative to change course. Plus they clearly enjoy destroying everything the lower classes do for fun and socialization.
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It’s now moved into CYA mode, and the politicians and some physicians are tripling down. I’ve been a part of weekly online meetings with my town. They always begin with a local ER doctor giving an update. A few weeks ago, he was all doom and gloom; he even said that the virus was found all over the schools. He also said that staying 6 feet apart is not enough, we have to be farther apart. Then not even five minutes later, he said that the social distancing we’re doing is working, since the curve is flattening. The next week, he said we should start opening up. The week after, we are having a massive surge and then said that we have a very high false negative rate with the virus. But if this was the case, then where are the bodies? If the false negative rate is so high, then there should be mountains of bodies and the hospital should be overrun. But he then said that they were below capacity for ventilators, etc. Yesterday, he outdid himself; he actually said with a straight face that “deaths from coronavirus are under reported.” There’s an ulterior motive to all of this, and it’s not fighting a disease that is a bad flu.
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Keep in mind hospitals are getting a fat check from Uncle Sam for every KungFlu patient. I’m sure that’s part of his equation.
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They’re in a bind. They have tanked the economy in their panic. If they let up now, then a lot of unemployed people start asking questions and they lose their positions of authority. If they keep the lockdowns going, they lost authority because people are slowly ignoring them. Had they done a two to four week lockdown, they would have been okay. But, somehow this has become a power play.
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The cruises seem like an easy kill. It is questionable if they will ever rebound to the levels BCW (Before Clown World). They were plague ships before this.
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