AMC just had the best weekend in a long time. The 106-year old cinema chain theater chain says ticket and concession sales hit an all time high from last Wednesday through Sunday (July 29th-Aug 2nd), thanks to the blockbuster debut of “Spider-Man: Brand New Day.”
For a company that has spent years fighting off bankruptcy talk and a mountain of debt, this is the kind of headline investors have been waiting for. But the bigger question is whether one great weekend means AMC’s business is turning a corner.
Here is what the numbers show, and what it means for anyone watching AMC (AMC) stock.
AMC benefits from Spider-Man’s huge opening
More than 10.2 million moviegoers showed up at AMC and its European brand ODEON from last Wednesday through Sunday.
It is the highest attendance for a single weekend in the company’s history for that stretch, and it made AMC’s admissions revenue and food and beverage revenue both touch all time records too.
“Spider-Man: Brand New Day” is the reason why.
The film opened to a media reported $355 million domestically and $927 million worldwide, according to CNBC, making it the second biggest domestic and global opening weekend gross of all time.
More Retail:
- Dollar General copies Costco’s playbook with a discount twist
- Pepsi and Coca-Cola bet big on soda Americans say they want
- Iconic supermarket chain closes more stores and facilities
Only Disney’s 2019 release of “Avengers: Endgame,” which brought in $357 million domestically, has done better.
AMC CEO Adam Aron emphasized:
“It is a powerful and unmistakable reminder that audiences overwhelmingly embrace the theatrical experience when studios release films that audiences want to see and support them with strong marketing campaigns.”
Odyssey packed AMC’s premium screens
Spider-Man was not the only draw. Christopher Nolan’s “The Odyssey” was still filling seats weeks after its own record opening.
AMC said its Lincoln Square 13 location in New York ran IMAX 70mm showtimes around the clock for a third straight weekend.
According to an earlier AMC statement from July 27, the studio recorded its highest IMAX revenue in company history through a film’s first two weekends thanks to “The Odyssey.”
Many of those IMAX 70mm showtimes were sold out into mid-August, and AMC said it was working with Universal Pictures and IMAX to add more.
That combination, a superhero blockbuster on regular and Dolby screens plus a prestige epic dominating IMAX, gave AMC something rare: a full house across nearly every format it operates.
AMC’s financials are on the rise
The box office boom is showing up in AMC’s books.
- Second quarter revenue came in at roughly $1.6 billion, up 14.2% from a year earlier.
- Operating profit jumped to $238.1 million, compared to just $92.6 million in the same quarter last year.
- EBITDA reached $321.4 million for the quarter, up almost 70% year over year.
CFO Sean Goodman said the quarter marked “the highest quarterly revenue and adjusted EBITDA in AMC’s entire history,” adding that the company did not simply ride the industry’s wave.
“We did not simply benefit from a stronger industry box office, we outperformed,” he said on the call.
Historical data from Fiscal.ai shows:
Operating cash flow also turned positive, at $218.7 million for the trailing twelve months, a sharp reversal from the negative figures AMC posted in 2022 and 2023.
Related: AMC just silenced the doubters with one quarter
Cash on hand stood at $778.4 million as of the most recent quarter, up from $428.5 million at the end of 2025.
Still, the balance sheet tells a more complicated story.
- AMC’s total liabilities of roughly $9.5 billion outweigh its total assets of about $8 billion, leaving shareholders’ equity in negative territory at $1.45 billion.
- Long-term debt sits near $3.7 billion, with another $3.25 billion in lease obligations.
- Free cash flow for the trailing twelve months was still negative $22.4 million, though that is a big improvement from an outflow of $365.9 million posted for full year 2025.
Based on these numbers, AMC looks like a company in the middle of a genuine turnaround rather than one that has fully healed.
Profitability and cash generation are improving, and management has used strong quarters to refinance debt and push out maturities to 2029.
On the July earnings call, Goodman said the company wants to bring leverage down to around 3x over time, admitting “that’s not where we are now.”
Aron was blunt about why the company keeps issuing new shares to raise cash. “The alternative to not repaying that debt would have been catastrophic,” he said on the call, pointing to a $125.5 million debt repayment the company needed to cover.
Revenue, EBITDA, and attendance are all moving in the right direction, and the Spider-Man and Odyssey weekends prove people still want to go to the movies.
But negative shareholders’ equity and a debt load north of $7 billion mean AMC still has real work to do before it can call itself financially strong.
For now, investors are betting the box office keeps cooperating, with Dune Part Three and Avengers Doomsday still to release before year-end.
Related: IMAX CEO sends strong words to investors and praises Nolan
