Disney’s US Studio Market Share Movies Toward 30%

There are a number of studies which produce and distribute movies in the U.S. The big ones are Walt Disney’s (NYSE: DIS), Time Warner’s (NYSE: TWX) Warner Bros. Sony (NYSE: SNE) Columbia, 21 Century Fox’s (NYSE: FOX) 20th Century Fox, and Comcast’s (NASDAQ: CMCSA) Universal. Walt’s Disney is about to take 30% of the overall domestic market, a nearly unprecedented level as ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ is released

On Friday, ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ produced domestic ticket sales of over $105 million. It is likely to be second best release in U.S. history behind only ‘ Star Wars: The Force Awakens’ which had first weekend ticket sales of $247 million. ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ is forecast to have ticket sales of $240 million. That will add to the success of ‘Black Panther”, also produced by Disney, with domestic ticket sale of $683 million this year.It opened February 16. The Black Panther character is also in ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ which should increase the film’s appeal

Disney’s market share through April 22 was 26.1%. Sales of ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ will move that ahead of $1 billion. The next studio on the list, Warner Bros., has a market share of 12.9%, followed by Sony/Columbia at 11.5% and 20th Century Fox at 11.4%. With its current lead, Disney may not be caught this year.

According to BoxOfficeMojo:

Following the record-breaking, $207.4 million opening for The Avengers in May of 2012, it took three years for another film to top the $200 million mark when Jurassic World debuted with $208.8 million in June 2015. Later that year Star Wars: The Force Awakens would go on to deliver the largest opening weekend ever, coming just shy of $250 million, en route to a domestic run topping $936 million. Since then, two more films have topped the $200 million mark over the course of their opening weekend in the recent releases of Star Wars: The Last Jedi and Black Panther, and with the release of Avengers: Infinity War this weekend, it isn’t so much a question of whether it will be the third film in the last five months to open over $200 million, but can it threaten Force Awakens’s all-time record?

An all time record for ‘Avengers: Infinity War’  could take Disney to a record annual year figure on a market share basis.