Disney Star Wars – the Finances

https://practicaleconomics.org/disney-star-wars-the-finances/

The bottom line is that Disney has to date suffered a $2.22 billion loss in 2012 US dollars from its LucasFilm purchase.

This was prior The Rise of Skywalker.

This means that if The Rise of Skywalker performs roughly as well as The Force Awakens and makes US$750 million in profit, it will be discounted to US$423 million for appropriate comparison with Disney’s US$4.05 billion purchase price.

TROS is actually leaning closer to Rogue One's figures. If it makes over 1B, this is gross revenue and not profit.

Disney's share is an estimated 50-60% WW depending on markets. You still have to discount the movie's production costs (roughly US $300 millions) and the marketing campaign (usually 50-75% of production costs for a big movie), before you turn in a profit. Please do the math.

Then you must adjust for inflation at the time of the purchase of LucasFilm (US $4.05 billion paid in 2012). Disney won't be close to break even after TROS.

To recover such a large purchase price Disney needed its early films to deliver consistently large profits. Unfortunately for Disney it hasn’t managed this.