• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, December 7, 2020

The global and U.S. ad outlook has improved markedly from earlier this year, according to revised year-end forecasts released by Madison Avenue's Big 3 ad forecasting units.

The worldwide consensus of the Big 3 -- WPP's GroupM, IPG Mediabrands' Magna, and Publicis' Zenith -- improved 4.1 percentage points for 2020, which is now projected to contact only 3.4% from 2019, while the global outlook for 2021 has expanded 1.1 percentage points with the worldwide ad economy projected to grow 7.8% next year.

GroupM had the biggest improvement in its global outlook, boosting its 2020 forecast 7.8 percentage points from its mid-year forecast in June, and increasing its 2021 outlook by 2.0 points.

"When we compare our forecasts now versus those we published in June, half, or approximately 30, of the markets we track saw improvements in expectations," writes GroupM Worldwide President-Business Intelligence Brian Wieser, noting: "Half as many saw significant levels of deterioration and a smaller number of markets remained relatively unchanged from our prior publication. This suggests that the breadth of improving expectations for conditions during 2020 was still relatively wide."

For the U.S., the 2020 outlook has also improved significantly, with the consensus now calling for a 3.4% contraction from 2019, an improvement of 2.9 percentage points from the 6.3% rate of erosion projected among the Big 3 in June.