• by Wayne Friedman , January 16, 2013

Strong revenues from the Summer Olympics, automobile, and U.S. political advertising helped push up global spending by 4.3% in the third quarter of 2012.

A report from Nielsen's Global AdView Pulse says third-quarter spending came in at $139 billion during the period, with a 4.3% improvement -- much better than the 2.7% growth rate for the first six months of 2012.

In addition, Nielsen says there were strong double-digit gains in the Middle East and Africa advertising markets -- up 18.9% year-to-date. In the U.S. itself, Nielsen says there was a 10.2% rise during the third-quarter period. The U.S. had a 5% improvement for the first nine months of 2012.

Advertising spend in Asia-Pacific countries grew at a bit under worldwide ad pacing growth -- 3.5%. Much of this came from a recovery in China after two consecutive declining quarters, says Nielsen, as the country picked up ad spending by 3.1%. Through nine months of 2012, the Asia-Pacific region had a 2.7% gain.

Western Europe continued to have troubles -- down 4.8% during the third quarter, with steep declines from the first six months of the year, which were at a 2.7% drop. All this put Western Europe down 3.4% for the first nine months of 2012.

Randall Beard, global head of advertiser solutions for Nielsen, said in a release:  “We’ll be watching carefully to see if the growth was sustained in Q4 and into 2013, or if there’s a dip in comparison to this year.”

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