earnings

Competitive tensions and ad tech drama have flared all year. And this drama has rippled out into the investor circle, as evident from a slew of recent ad tech company earnings reports.

Is it just me, or do third-quarter earnings always seem especially strange?

We break down some of the most interesting financial trends coming out of Q3 earnings reports, and what rises to the level of being worth covering in the first place.

Paramount Skydance, which officially turns 100 days old this week, released its first post-merger quarterly earnings report on Monday.

The Trade Desk posted solid Q3 results on Thursday, with $739 million in revenue, up 18% year over year. But the main narrative for TTD this year is less about the numbers and more about optics and competitive dynamics.

AppLovin may be facing heat over its data privacy practices, but soaring profits and big AI ad bets have investors cheering anyway.

Before Warner Bros. Discovery’s Q3 earnings call even began on Thursday, the investor relations team made it clear that leadership did not want to talk about the company currently trying to sell parts of itself to potential bidders.

Magnite says it’s not mad at The Trade Desk for prioritizing OpenPath or labeling all supply-side platforms as “resellers.”

Two quarterly reports might not be enough to confirm a pattern. But it is enough information to draw a line – and so far, that line is going up for MNTN.

If Roku’s third quarter earnings call could be distilled into a single phrase, it would be “early days.” (With “bullish” as a runner-up, perhaps.)

Comcast has had a pretty rough go of it lately – but there’s still plenty of room for a turnaround.

Alphabet reported on Wednesday that its total Q3 revenue was $102.3 billion, up 16% year over year, while net profit increased by a third to $35 billion.

AI agents have infiltrated retail media. At least, that’s how it felt to big Wall Street advertising and tech investors, who brought a sense of existential dread to Criteo’s quarterly earnings call on Wednesday.

Meta’s Q3 earnings saw increased growth in its ad business and continued the conversation on superintelligence.

In a livestreamed presentation to investors on Tuesday, co-CEO Greg Peters shared that Netflix had its “best ad sales quarter ever” in Q3, and more than doubled its upfront commitments for this year.

What can pureplay ad tech companies do to clean up their rep on the Street?

When The Trade Desk sneezes, ad tech catches a cold.

The Trade Desk continued its shaky 2025 earnings schedule when it reported Q2 results on Thursday.

The pivot to AI has led to a gap in many SaaS and ad tech companies’ payment models; AppLovin bounces back in Q2; and Grok might be your newest media planner.

Total revenue for the quarter was $9.8 billion, up only 1% year-over-year from the last Q2 quarter total of $9.7 billion – which is modest, but at least in line with company expectations.

The New York Times’ growth rate blows other large news companies out of the water; Shopify’s shares leapt by 20% after an upbeat Q2 earnings report; and Google’s AI Overviews may or may not be causing web traffic to plummet, depending who you ask.

Roku’s video advertising business has really been booming lately, as CEO Anthony Wood shared on a call with investors Thursday evening.

NBCU’s streaming losses were down to $100 million in Q2 from $348 million year-over-year, representing significant progress as the platform nears break-even.

Criteo’s Q2 earnings report on Wednesday was marked by flatness.

The web is hurting. Google is doing splendidly. Q2 was a “standout,” Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai told investors on Tuesday, with “robust growth across the company.”

Sing along, now: “Everything is an ad network!” Plus, Publicis is doing A-OK and Substack is changing its tune on advertising.

Netflix, which reported its Q2 earnings on Thursday, generated more than $11 billion in overall revenue last quarter, up 15.9% year-over-year.

If you felt a strange gust around 5 p.m. ET on Thursday, it was probably just the cumulative sighs of relief across Wall Street as The Trade Desk shook off its Q4 blues with a better-than-expected first quarter earnings report.

When it comes to third-party cookies on Chrome, Google’s plan to reverse course is neither here nor there, says Magnite CEO Michael Barrett. “Forget Privacy Sandbox,” Barrett said. “That thing was dead upon arrival.”

Happy first IPO-aversary, Reddit. (And happy 20th birthday.) The market got you a present. Reddit’s stock soared nearly 18% in after-hours trading on Thursday thanks to a revenue beat in the first quarter.