The Trade Desk, Inc. TTD will report its fourth-quarter 2025 results on Feb. 25, after market close.
The Zacks Consensus Estimate for the bottom line in the to-be-reported quarter is pegged at 59 cents, the same as in the prior-year quarter. The estimate has been unchanged in the past 60 days. The consensus estimate for total revenues is pinned at $841.9 million, implying a 13.6% year-over-year increase.
TTD expects revenues to be at least $840 million. Excluding the benefit of U.S. political ad spend in the prior-year quarter, the revenue growth rate is projected to be 18.5% on a year-over-year basis. It projects $375 million in adjusted EBITDA.
TTD’s earnings beat the Zacks Consensus Estimate in three of the trailing four quarters, while missing once, with an average surprise of 8.4%.
Let us see how TTD is expected to fare in terms of revenues and earnings this time around.
Our proven model does not predict an earnings beat for TTD this time around. The combination of a positive Earnings ESP and a Zacks Rank #1 (Strong Buy), 2 (Buy), or 3 (Hold) increases the chances of an earnings beat. But that is not the case here. You can uncover the best stocks to buy or sell before they are reported with our Earnings ESP Filter.
TTD has an Earnings ESP of 0.00% and carries a Zacks Rank #4 (Sell).
You can see the complete list of today’s Zacks #1 Rank stocks here.
Continued momentum in key business areas, such as Connected TV (“CTV”), is expected to have cushioned TTD’s top-line performance in the to-be-reported quarter. CTV is the fastest-growing segment of the digital ad market, given the ongoing shift from linear TV.
On the last earnings call, management noted that the transition toward biddable CTV has been gaining rapid momentum and it expects decision CTV to become the default buying model in the future. The benefits of decision-based buying (like greater flexibility, control and performance) compared with traditional programmatic guaranteed or insertion-order models, are rendering it the logical choice for advertisers.
Apart from CTV, momentum in retail media, international expansion, the Kokai platform and efforts to strengthen go-to-market capabilities are likely to have acted as tailwinds.
85% clients use Kokai as their default experience and this has been strengthening its competitive moat. TTD highlighted that Kokai delivered (on average) 26% better cost per acquisition, 58% better cost per unique reach and a 94% better click-through rate compared with Solimar.
TTD’s OpenPath, Deal Desk, Pubdesk and OpenAds initiatives further strengthen its ecosystem by connecting advertisers directly to publishers, improving transparency and supply-chain efficiency. It recently announced that OpenAds was now supported by prominent publishers like AccuWeather, The Guardian, The Arena Group, BuzzFeed, Hearst Magazines, Hearst TV, Newsweek, People Inc. and Ziff Davis.
The Trade Desk Price and EPS Surprise
The Trade Desk price-eps-surprise | The Trade Desk Quote
While North America accounts for 87% of advertising spend, TTD has been steadily expanding its global footprint, driven by faster-growing international markets. This increasing global presence offers clients localized marketplace expertise across key regions.
Though TTD is focusing on geographic expansion, executing well across disparate markets can be complex and risky. Regulatory and privacy-related changes like the deprecation of cookies and tightening data-privacy laws like Europe’s GDPR also pose ongoing challenges.
Further, the intensely competitive nature of the digital advertising industry, dominated by walled gardens like Alphabet GOOGL and Amazon AMZN, as well as players like Magnite MGNI, continues to put pressure on TTD’s market positioning. Amazon’s expanding DSP business has been giving tough competition to TTD, especially in the CTV space.
Even Magnite is expanding its presence in CTV and retail media and competing for ad dollars. Moreover, digital advertising is more of a buyer’s market, where supply is generally greater than demand. This implies persistent pricing and margin pressure and a need for innovation to maintain differentiation.
The company is focused on embedding AI across the portfolio, which will further raise capex and operational costs. Rising expenses, coupled with investments, could compress margins if revenue growth slows. In the last reported quarter, total operating costs (excluding stock-based compensation) surged 17% year over year to $457 million. Expenses soared due to continued investments in enhancing platform capabilities, particularly in platform operations. Macro-driven caution around advertising budgets remains a significant concern for a pure-play ad tech company like The Trade Desk.
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Analysts have kept their estimates unchanged for the fourth quarter for TTD’s bottom line over the past 60 days.
TTD’s shares have declined 51.4% over the past six months. It has significantly underperformed the Internet-Services industry and the Zacks S&P 500 composite’s rise of 43.6% and 9.1%, respectively.
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The company has underperformed compared with its digital advertising peers, including Alphabet (up 52.2%), Amazon (down 8.5%), and Magnite (down 45%).
The stock is trading at a premium with a forward 12-month price/earnings of 11.82X compared with the industry’s 25.3X.
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AMZN, GOOGL and MGNI are trading at forward 12-month price/earnings multiples of 25.65X, 25.7X and 11.45X, respectively.
Despite strong execution in CTV and retail media, The Trade Desk’s near-term setup looks unfavorable heading into its fourth-quarter earnings.
Macroeconomic uncertainty and intensifying competition from Amazon and Alphabet are likely to have pressured near-term performance. While the Kokai platform, Deal Desk and OpenPath initiatives are strategically sound, their benefits may take time to materially impact profitability.
Given these factors, it may not be a wise idea to bet on TTD stock. It is better to wait for management’s commentary and 2026 guidance. Investors may be better off waiting for a more attractive entry point.
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This article originally published on Zacks Investment Research (zacks.com).
