• by Joe Mandese  @mp_joemandese, June 10, 2024

Citing major improvements in the economies of the world's biggest advertising markets -- the U.S. and China -- GroupM significantly upgraded the outlook for total ad spending growth from its last forecast in December 2023. The global ad market now is expected to expand 9.8% this year, a 3.1 percentage point improvement from what it previously forecast.

U.S. ad spending is now expected to expand 9.0%, up 2.5 percentage points from GroupM's December 2023 estimate.

Excluding U.S. political ad spending, the GroupM forecasts 2024's underlying growth will be +7.8% to $989.8 billion and is on track to surpass $1 trillion next year -- a year earlier than GroupM had originally forecasted.

Excluding the impact of political ad spending, the U.S. ad market is now expected to expand 5.4% to $380.6 billion this year.

GroupM's upward revision boosts the Big 4 holding company global for 2024 consensus up to +6.7% from 5.9% when Dentsu issued its update May 29.

The 2024 U.S. ad consensus moves up to 7.5% from 7.1%.