Economics
Shanghai Disney Draws 4 Million Guests, Sees Break-Even ’17
- Company will be ‘thrilled’ with 10 million first-year visits
- Shanghai Disneyland opened in June at cost of $5.5 billion
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Walt Disney Co. said its new $5.5 billion Shanghai theme park attracted four million visitors in its first four months and will be close to breaking even in its first full year of operation in 2017.
About 50 percent of the park’s guests are from outside the Shanghai area, a “big surprise” as the Chinese city had been expected to account for more than three-quarters of visitors initially, Disney Chief Executive Officer Bob Iger said in an interview with Bloomberg TV Thursday. “The fact that it’s so balanced leads us to believe that word of mouth on this and the intent to visit from well beyond Shanghai is very, very high,” he said.