Wells Fargo analyst Steven Cahall predicted that Netflix's subscriber count might suffer in its third fiscal quarter due to the controversy surrounding the release of Maïmouna Doucouré's French coming-of-age drama, Cuties.

Cahall initially projected that the streaming service would experience a 500,000 subscriber growth gain in Netflix's third-quarter, but cut that number by 50 percent, as reported by THR.

RELATED: Cuties Financier Denounces US Netflix Boycott for Violating Artistic Criticism

"If we are to believe reports, then Netflix faced a short-lived but potentially stark churn uptick in September due to controversy around Cuties," Cahall said in a recently published report. "We think this could weigh more heavily on third-quarter net adds than investors realize, so we reduce our estimate for global streaming net adds."

"We're not sure that gross adds will be up sequentially given the [fact] that its first and second quarters in 2020 likely benefited from lockdowns and a lack of live content elsewhere," Cahall explained. "Our churn sensitivity analysis suggests negative net adds are a possibility... If we assume that churn increased five times for a single week due to Cuties, it implies...28 million deactivations in the third quarter."

RELATED: Cuties: Controversy Over Netflix Film Results in a Major Viewership Boost

Cahall's report arrived a week after a Screen Engine/ASI poll found that 52 percent of U.S. subscribers who watched the film after its release on Netflix watched "because" of its controversy.

Cuties tells the story of an 11-year-old girl from a traditional Muslim Senegalese family who tries to fit in by joining a group of young dancers who perform sexually-suggestive routines and post them online. Netflix came under scrutiny for promoting the film with a poster that showed the young female cast in over-sexualized clothes and poses. The backlash resulted in the #CancelNetflix campaign trending online and several members of Congress calling for the film to be banned. The streaming service responded by apologizing "for the inappropriate artwork" and pulling the poster.

KEEP READING: Netflix Defends Cuties, Labeling Film as 'Social Commentary'

Source: THR