Trade Desk downgraded to Sell at New Street on difficult post-election comps

As previously reported, New Street downgraded Trade Desk (TTD) to Sell from Neutral with an unchanged price target of $86. Enthusiasm for the stock is “understandable” as smaller walled gardens continue giving Trade Desk more access to their premium inventory and the company’s top competitor, Google’s (GOOGL) DV 360, continues to give share according to all of the firm’s recent industry conversations, says the analyst, who adds that “there’s no change to our view that TTD is best-in-class for vision, strategy and execution.” However, the challenge is 2025 as consensus implies about 30% core spend growth excluding political, up from 19% in 2024. The firm believes that core spend growth can accelerate in 2025, just not to the level that consensus implies, arguing that 2025 consensus is not properly reflecting the difficult comps that will follow the U.S. election.