The Trade Desk -- the biggest U.S. demand-side advertising platform -- registered another quarterly revenue gain of over 20% -- up 26% in its second-quarter 2024 period to $585 million.

This was higher than analysts' consensus estimates of $578 million, with the company touting a gain of over 20% for the past 10 quarters.

Net income more than doubled over the same period a year ago -- $85 million versus $33 million.

The company estimates revenue of $618 million in the third quarter, which would be a 25% hike.

Growth in connected TV (CTV) programmatic advertising continues to drive the business.

Media analyst Brian Wieser, who writes for the Substack newsletters, estimates political advertising -- around the Presidential political election season -- likely added a few percentage points.

The Trade Desk has continued to make gains when it comes to adoption of its identity graph, Unified ID 2.0, among major TV-streaming-based legacy media companies: Fox Corp., Walt Disney, NBCUniversal, Paramount Global and Warner Bros. Discovery, among others. t

The Trade Desk said it has seen rising usage and value of "open" CTV ad inventory that it and other DSPs used to secure ad inventory versus that of “walled garden” content providers. 

One report in a recent Trade Desk publication pointed to sources that said 61% of consumer time is now with the open internet, while 39% is with “walled gardens.”  Open internet channels include premium TV/video and digital audio.

In remarks to analysts last week, Jeff Green, chief executive officer of The Trade Des, said it is only recently that this was the reverse, with much of consumers’ time spent in “walled gardens” internet content.

Green says marketers have used advertising technology for "cheap reach," and added that after several years of uncertainty, "the business flaws of cheap reach are more apparent than ever." 

Wieser responds that cheap reach is most likely a major issue, but adds: “Often marketers will use DSPs to achieve cheap-er reach on the open web.  Data-driven buying is not, by itself, a solution, especially as data associated with the open web is much more likely to be flawed and limited versus walled gardens or subscription-based platforms with known and logged-in users.”