It has been a painful year for The Trade Desk (NASDAQ: TTD).
The stock has plunged roughly 67% year-to-date, falling through two major sell-offs, including a brutal 39% drop in August after the company issued soft guidance.
With that kind of drawdown, investors naturally want answers.
Is this just another fallen growth stock, or is there still something worth holding on to?
The company’s third-quarter 2025 results provided an important clue.
The question this time was not just about the earnings numbers. It was about the story. Has the leading programmatic advertising platform fixed its problems, or is the market right to be nervous?
Growth Is Not Dead: The US$739 Million Reality Check
For the quarter, The Trade Desk reported US$739 million in revenue.
That is an 18% increase from a year ago.
If we remove the political ad spending that inflated last year’s results during the US election, underlying growth actually accelerated to 22%, an increase from 19% in the previous quarter.
Those are not the numbers of a company in decline.
The financial foundation remains solid as well.
The company holds more than US$1.4 billion in cash and has zero debt. Free cash flow (FCF) came in at US$155 million, showing that the core engine is still running well.
The message is straightforward. The Trade Desk is not broken. The market simply wants faster growth to support the valuation it once held.
CEO vs Amazon: Are They Even Playing the Same Game?
Investor anxiety today centres around competition, especially from Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN).
Amazon’s advertising division grew more than 23% year on year and generated nearly 24 times The Trade Desk’s revenue.
It is easy to see why this comparison worries the market.
CEO Jeff Green addressed these concerns directly, explaining that the bulk of Amazon’s advertising revenue comes from sponsored listings, which function much like Google Search ads.
In other words, this is a different arena from The Trade Desk’s core focus on open internet programmatic advertising.
Advertising budgets are limited.
Every dollar Amazon wins directly reduces The Trade Desk’s growth opportunity, a challenge CEO Green must still overcome with investors.
Poaching Google’s Best: The Rebuild You Should Not Ignore
While the stock collapsed, the company spent 2025 rebuilding itself internally. It refreshed nearly the entire top leadership team.
A new COO, a new CFO, and, most notably, a new Chief Revenue Officer were hired, the latter who left Google to join The Trade Desk.
Executive talent doesn’t join a failing company.
When senior leaders from giants like Google and Amazon choose to cross over, it tells you there is a long game being played.
The company’s AI-driven platform, Kokai, is also delivering strong results. Since its launch, clients have seen:
- 26% better cost per acquisition (CPA)
- 94% improvement in click-through rates (CTR)
Those improvements are not trivial.
They are convincing advertisers to commit.
Joint Business Plans (JBPs) now make up roughly half of the company’s revenue and are growing faster than the rest of the business.
With over 180 active JBPs and another 80 in the pipeline, The Trade Desk is locking in its largest customers for multiple years.
This is not behaviour you see from clients when a company is losing relevance.
Value Trap or Bargain Buy?
A 67% decline is severe.
At around US$39, the stock looks very different from where it started the year.
Investors are no longer asked to pay for hypergrowth.
They are paying for a profitable business with strong cash flow, a powerful AI engine, and a leadership team that is actively rebuilding for the next decade.
The competition is real, especially from trillion-dollar titans.
But the numbers show that the underlying business is far from broken.
For investors who believe in the long-term future of the open internet and the strength of The Trade Desk’s AI platform, the current share price may offer a much more reasonable valuation than before.
Generative AI is reshaping the stock market, but not in the way most investors think. It’s not just about which companies are using AI. It’s about how they’re using it to unlock new revenue, dominate their markets, and quietly reshape the business world. Our latest FREE report “How GenAI is Reshaping the Stock Market” breaks the hype down, so you can invest with greater clarity and confidence. Click here to download your copy today.
Follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Telegram for the latest investing news and analyses!
Disclosure: Fel T. owns shares of Amazon, Google and The Trade Desk.
