Netflix has a problem layoffs can't solve

Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos has guided the streamer through growth concerns before.

Can he pull it off again? Bloomberg/Getty Images Netflix has responded to a slumping stock price by cutting 6% of its staff.

The streamer has dealt with growth concerns before and bounced back.

This time around could be different: Netflix's big worry isn't other streamers like HBO, but mega tech platforms like YouTube and TikTok.

The good news for Netflix: It's been here before.

In 2022, after years of breakneck growth and go-go spending, the streamer suddenly lost subscribers.

Cue layoffs, a hasty pivot to an ad model it had always criticized, and tons of industry schadenfreude .

But it turned out that Netflix's growth problems were overstated.

Or at least, that its growth problems weren't a sign of opportunity for its streaming rivals.

Years later, Netflix's position at the top of paid streaming services remains unchanged .

Meanwhile, Wall Street has grown tired of watching would-be competitors like Paramount and Warner Bros.

Discovery struggle to make headway — which is why both of those companies are now owned by the Ellison family .

The bad news for Netflix: The levers it pulled four years ago no longer seem available.

It has already done the ads thing, and the live sports thing — another move they had previously sworn off.