NETFLIX IS GETTING TOTALED

Netflix stock is getting totaled, down 23% at the market's open.

On Wednesday the company reported much lower than expected subscriber growth in the 3rd quarter. It also lowered its guidance for the 4th quarter.

Netflix added two million international subs vs. guidance of 2.36 million and 975,000 domestic streaming subs vs. guidance of 1.33 million.

To get a true grasp of how brutal this is, check out the stock's 5-day chart.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings blamed the subscriber drop off on a $1 price increase the company instituted back this spring.

"Our best sense is it's an effect of our price increase back in May. With a little bit higher prices, you get a little bit fewer subscribers. So that's our sense of it. But we can't be 100% sure. We had so much benefit from Orange in Q2 and the early Q3, but that's what we think."

Netflix was also hurt by HBO's announcement that it would create its own online streaming subscriber service. For Netflix it means a juggernaut is getting into the game. HBO is bigger internationally than Netflix with 120 million members world wide to HBO's 53 million.

In the meantime analysts up and down Wall Street are cutting their guidance to match Netflix's numbers.

Even the most bullish analysts, like Raymond James' Aaron Kessler and Justin Patterson, are guiding down dramatically for next year (while still sounding optimistic).

"Netflix guided 4Q14 EPS to $0.44 vs. our and the consensus prior estimates of $0.95 and $0.86, respectively, primarily due to higher international expansion costs. We note that Netflix remains optimistic on recent international launches, citing healthy viewing hours in France and Germany.... For 2014, our revenue estimate increases by 0.3% and our GAAP EPS estimate decreases by 11%. For 2015, our revenue estimate decreases by 1.7% (slower sub growth assumptions), while our GAAP EPS estimate declines by 30% (due largely to expectations for higher international costs)."