By Patience Haggin
The Trade Desk carved out a niche as a fast-growing underdog that could take on Google in the digital-ad space. Now the challenger faces challenges of its own -- and its stock is down about 70% over the past year.
The ad-tech company is contending with frustrated agency partners, an exodus of top executives, continued competitive pressure from Google and a fierce new rival in Amazon.com. Its recent stock decline illustrates the fast-changing fortunes of players in the multibillion-dollar digital ad industry, with advertisers rethinking how they spend brands' money for maximum impact and a few big tech companies consolidating control by competing on price and targeting capabilities.
Trade Desk, founded in 2009, positioned itself as a plucky upstart competitor to Google in the market for helping companies buy online ads across publishers' websites. It captured significant market share, in part by forging relationships with ad agencies as other ad-tech players were trying to bypass those companies and get business directly from the brands.
Trade Desk went public in 2016 and clocked steady quarters of strong revenue growth, often upward of 25% in year-over-year gains. Chief Executive Jeff Green became known as a charismatic industry thought leader, frequently commenting on Google's digital-ad dominance and general ad-market trends in public appearances.
The company's market capitalization peaked at nearly $69 billion in December 2024 -- more than the four largest ad-agency holding companies combined at the time. It took the lead in the U.S. for buying ads across a large number of websites with about 30% market share, according to industry advisory firm Madison and Wall. This estimate doesn't include connected TV advertising on some premium streaming services.
Now Trade Desk's market cap hovers around $10 billion, and its disrupter narrative has lost steam. Amazon is gaining ground thanks to its approach of selling ads on its search results, product pages and Prime Video, as well as on third-party sites. It has been attracting marketers by targeting ads based on consumers' purchase history and offering low prices. Amazon now has a 12% market share, according to Madison and Wall.
Meta Platforms dominates the market for small-business advertising and is building up its business with the help of artificial-intelligence tools, while Google's long history and scale, as well as its array of offerings that can target ads based on users' search, location and YouTube history, keep it pulling in hundreds of billions of dollars in ad revenue annually.
"It's hard to compete when you run into the buzz saw of Google, Amazon and Meta," said Eric Schmitt, a vice president analyst at research and advisory firm Gartner.
Trade Desk's momentum has also sputtered because its relationships with ad firms began to sour. In recent months, four of the five largest ad-agency holding companies have expressed concerns about Trade Desk's "take rate," the percentage of ad spending it keeps as transaction fees. Executives had long touted a 20% take rate -- higher than Google and Amazon's but lower than other independent competitors.
Last year, some ad buyers wondered whether Trade Desk could be effectively taking more via add-on fees, a fear they said was confirmed when the company reported figures in February that implied a higher take rate. Early this year holding companies Dentsu and WPP changed their default settings with Trade Desk to no longer use a certain product, said people familiar with the matter.
Then in March, holding company Publicis Groupe told clients it would no longer recommend they work with Trade Desk, citing an audit for which the company declined to provide certain documents, according to people familiar with the matter. Weeks later, Publicis rival Omnicom told clients it would audit Trade Desk, too, said people familiar with their decision.
Trade Desk reported earlier this month that its quarterly revenue growth slowed to 12% year-over-year. The company cited macro headwinds like war and tariffs for the deceleration, saying those factors pressured the brands that make up its client base, and guided for 8% growth in the second quarter. When asked about discussions with Publicis during the earnings call, Green said the situation had been "over-dramatized" and the company was in ongoing negotiations with Publicis.
Some analysts eye the fuss over fees with skepticism. "Agencies are just looking to squeeze down that fee, and they're playing hardball to try and cut the rate that Trade Desk is charging them," said Luke Stillman, managing director of Madison and Wall.
Trade Desk has cycled through three chief financial officers in the past 12 months and seen an exodus of other top executives and board members -- including four directors since March. Some of the departed leaders were frustrated both with the company's transparency around its take rate and Green's leadership decisions, said people familiar with the matter.
Despite the slowing revenue growth and shifting industry trends in favor of big tech platforms, Green remains optimistic about Trade Desk's prospects. He cited the company's growth in streaming video, audio and international markets. He criticized marketers who focus on cutting costs over pursuing growth in the company's earnings call earlier this month, and assured investors, "Our best days are ahead of us."
Write to Patience Haggin at patience.haggin@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
May 27, 2026 10:00 ET (14:00 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2026 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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