Raymond James announced it was downgrading shares of Rubicon Project from “Outperform” to “Market Perform” -- a sign that the programmatic marketplace is experiencing some
"headwinds" with respect to desktop advertising and specifically, from increased adoption of header bidding.
In a research note, the financial services company said Rubicon was “late to
develop [header bidding]” and “thus it is losing impression share to competitors.”
While Rubicon introduced its header bidding offering last December, “Rubicon is
behind other market players and it will likely take some time for Rubicon to gain greater market adoption,” the note said. Raymond James expects sales to remain “pressured through the end
of 2016 and likely into 2017 as well as desktop remains 67% of managed spend as of Q2.”
That’s disappointing news for Rubicon, which is considered one of the strongest players in
the ad-tech ecosystem.
Rubicon, of late, has been touting its mobile
video platform and promoting it aggressively.