Claim that Netflix stock fell after it donated to Harris campaign is satire

Spoiler alert: Netflix’s stock didn’t plummet 40% after the company donated to Vice President Kamala Harris’ presidential campaign, contrary to viral social media posts. That claim originated as satire.

A July 26 Facebook post included an image of Harris, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, with the headline, "Netflix stock tumbled almost 40% after big campaign donation announcement - $2 billion lost in 4 hours." The post’s caption read, "Perhaps big corps will learn to stay out of politics … I couldn’t be any happier about this!!"

Similar posts gained traction on X.

The social media posts were flagged as part of Meta’s efforts to combat false news and misinformation on its News Feed. (Read more about our partnership with Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram.) 

The posts fall into the fiction genre; they originated from a website called the Dunning-Kruger Times, which describes its content as "parody, satire, and tomfoolery." 

 (Screenshot from Facebook)

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stated on October 27, 2024 in an Instagram post

Vice Presidential nominee Tim Walz “says that if Democrats win they’ll make (U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez) speaker of the house.”

"Netflix, the company long associated with the Obamas, has gone fully woke and donated $7 million to the Kamala Harris campaign," the article said. "In return, the American people canceled subscriptions at an alarming rate and the company lost billions in market cap overnight." 

The article alludes to a real $7 million donation made by Reed Hastings, Netflix’s co-founder and executive chairman, to a super PAC supporting Harris’ presidential campaign.

But the article and social media posts falsely claim that the donation came from the company, rather than Hastings. 

The Federal Election Commission’s website says that "campaigns may not accept contributions from the treasury funds of corporations."

Netflix does have a political action committee, Netflix Inc PAC, and can use it to donate to candidates. But according to its FEC filings, it last contributed money to a candidate in 2018, when it donated $5,000 to Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom’s California gubernatorial campaign. 

We also found no evidence that Netflix’s stock fell 40% following Hastings’ donation. According to Yahoo Finance, the stock is down only about 3% over the past five days as of July 30. 

We rate claims that Netflix’s stock tumbled after the company donated to Harris’ presidential campaign False.