“Avatar 2: The Way of Water” may not have delivered quite the box office punch that Disney (NYSE:DIS) was looking for. The early reports were bad enough to drop Disney stock down to the lowest levels since 2020. However, it did deliver quite a boost to a company down the line. Specifically, IMAX (NYSE:IMAX), which was up substantially in Thursday’s trading. Interestingly, some analysts—like MKM Partners—are suggesting that it’s because of Avatar 2 that IMAX may be in line for a nice jump-up.
One of the best things about the movie for IMAX theaters is that it’s likely to be in play for the entire holiday season and beyond, with no other major tentpole releases coming out until February. That’s when Disney will drop “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania.”
Thus, that leaves Avatar 2 to run the table for some time as movie theaters start to look as vibrant as they did in 2019. Studios are releasing films at about the same pace they did previously. That puts a return to normalcy at least somewhat on the table. Given that IMAX Global Network was directly responsible for 11.2% of Avatar 2’s worldwide gross—and 27% of its Chinese results—that puts IMAX at the head of a big part of cinema’s return.
Since IMAX has an average price target of $20.13, that gives it an upside potential of 39.31%.
