Teads (TEAD), conferencia de resultados del 3T de 2026: crecimiento de la CTV en medio de la caída de ingresos

Puntos clave

• Los ingresos del tercer trimestre de 2026 cayeron un 26% interanual hasta situarse en aproximadamente 235 millones de dólares, mientras que el beneficio bruto ex-TAC retrocedió un 28% hasta los 93,5 millones de dólares.
• El EBITDA ajustado fue negativo en 8 millones de dólares. El flujo de caja libre fue negativo en 33 millones de dólares tras un pago semestral de intereses de 31 millones de dólares, mientras que el flujo de caja libre antes de intereses fue negativo en 1,4 millones de dólares.
• El beneficio bruto ex-TAC del segmento Enterprise disminuyó un 14% hasta los 75 millones de dólares, lo que refleja un mes de agosto débil en EMEA y las continuas presiones en la Internet abierta. Norteamérica retrocedió un 15%, mientras que APAC creció un 5%.
• Los ingresos por televisión conectada aumentaron un 37%, representaron aproximadamente el 20% del negocio de Enterprise y alcanzaron casi 100 millones de dólares en el acumulado del año hasta el tercer trimestre.
• El beneficio bruto ex-TAC de respuesta directa y pymes se desplomó un 50% hasta los 20 millones de dólares, debido a que los resúmenes de búsqueda generados por IA y los cambios en los algoritmos redujeron el tráfico de referencia y las páginas vistas de los editores.
• Teads registró un deterioro contable del fondo de comercio de 272 millones de dólares sin salida de efectivo. La dirección está revisando reducciones adicionales de costes y busca una estructura de capital más sólida a largo plazo.

Datos financieros principales

Rendimiento comercial y operativo

La televisión conectada siguió siendo el principal motor de crecimiento de Teads. Los ingresos aumentaron un 37% en el tercer trimestre, aunque la dirección indicó que el crecimiento fue más lento que en trimestres anteriores antes de acelerarse de nuevo en octubre. La compañía amplió su presencia en pantallas de inicio a más de 500 millones de dispositivos en todo el mundo a través de alianzas que incluyen a Whale TV y Telly.

Teads está utilizando el inventario de CTV para respaldar paquetes omnicanal más amplios que combinan ubicaciones en pantallas de inicio, CTV in-stream y publicidad web. La empresa también lanzó la última versión de Teads Ad Manager, que integra la planificación y compra omnicanal mediante flujos de trabajo basados en agentes.

El desempeño de Enterprise se debilitó de forma secuencial. La dirección atribuyó el deterioro principalmente a un mes de agosto inesperadamente flojo en EMEA, a factores macroeconómicos y a la presión estructural en toda la Internet abierta. Durante el trimestre, Teads firmó nuevas alianzas comerciales conjuntas con BMW, Lenovo, Shell y Kia.

El negocio de respuesta directa y pymes afrontó una mayor presión. La dirección afirmó que las páginas vistas de los editores cayeron entre un 20% y un 60% en algunos casos debido a los resúmenes de búsqueda generados por IA y a los cambios en los algoritmos. La disminución del tráfico redujo las impresiones disponibles y las oportunidades en publicidad de resultados.

Teads está promocionando EngageOS para ayudar a los editores a mejorar el rendimiento y el compromiso de los usuarios. La compañía señaló que algunos editores asociados lograron un crecimiento de dos dígitos en estas métricas. Entre los clientes y socios mencionados figuraron Huffington Post, Le Monde, Prisma, Axel Springer y Politico, a los que se sumaron ABC News y Fandom como nuevos editores prémium.

Perspectivas de la dirección

La dirección indicó que el desempeño a comienzos del cuarto trimestre mostró cierta recuperación respecto al tercero gracias a mejoras operativas y a la estacionalidad, aunque persistieron presiones similares en el ecosistema. Octubre también registró una renovada aceleración en CTV y una mejora frente a la debilidad observada en partes de Europa durante agosto.

La compañía considera que las caídas en las páginas vistas de los editores podrían haberse estabilizado, mientras que las mejoras en los algoritmos internos están favoreciendo una mejor monetización del tráfico restante. La dirección también prevé aplicar mayores reducciones de costes, después de que los gastos, excluyendo el deterioro del fondo de comercio, disminuyeran aproximadamente un 10% interanual en el tercer trimestre.

Teads sigue dialogando con los tenedores de deuda mientras evalúa su estructura de capital. El nuevo director financiero, Michael Coyle, afirmó que entre sus prioridades figuran la transformación operativa, la disciplina financiera y la creación de una estructura de capital más resiliente.

Riesgos y aspectos a vigilar

• Los resúmenes de búsqueda generados por IA y los cambios en los algoritmos de búsqueda están reduciendo el tráfico de referencia, las páginas vistas de los editores y el inventario publicitario en toda la Internet abierta.
• La dirección mencionó una continua volatilidad en los ingresos, una menor conversión presupuestaria y un entorno de monetización más complejo.
• El negocio de respuesta directa y pymes está especialmente expuesto, ya que su producto de feed exige cubrir la totalidad del inventario disponible.
• La debilidad en EMEA, especialmente durante agosto, contribuyó a la ralentización de Enterprise, mientras que Norteamérica retrocedió un 15% interanual.
• Los pagos de intereses siguen representando una carga significativa para el flujo de caja, con un pago que ascendió a 31 millones de dólares en agosto.
• La empresa está evaluando tanto su base de costes como su estructura de capital ante la caída de los ingresos y una pérdida en el EBITDA ajustado.

Puntos destacados de la sesión de preguntas y respuestas con analistas

Al ser consultado sobre la caída del tráfico, el CEO David Kostman declaró que algunos editores experimentaron reducciones de páginas vistas de entre el 20% y el 60%. Señaló que los descensos parecían estabilizarse, aunque la dirección planteó esa valoración con cautela, y destacó una mejora en la monetización a través de los algoritmos de Teads.

En cuanto a los costes, el director financiero saliente, Jason Kiviat, afirmó que los costes operativos se redujeron aproximadamente un 10% interanual sin contar el deterioro, pero la dirección aún ve margen para ajustar más la estructura de costes.

Con respecto a la CTV, la dirección describió la ralentización del tercer trimestre como un fenómeno en parte estacional y afirmó que el crecimiento volvió a acelerarse en octubre. Teads prevé aprovechar su posicionamiento en pantallas de inicio en más de 500 millones de dispositivos para comercializar campañas integradas de CTV y web a través de grandes agencias.

Transcripción completa de la conferencia de resultados

Transcripción completa de la conferencia de resultados

Comentarios de la dirección

Unknown Executive

Good morning, and thank you for joining us on today's conference call to discuss Teads' third quarter results. Joining me on the call today, we have David Kostman, CEO; Jason Kiviat, current CFO; and Michael Coyle, incoming CFO of Teads. During this conference call, management will make forward-looking statements based on current expectations and assumptions, including statements regarding our business outlook and prospects. Statements are subject to risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ materially from our forward-looking statements. These risk factors are discussed in detail in our annual report on Form 10-K for the year ended December 31, 2025, as updated in our subsequent reports filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Forward-looking statements speak only as of the call's original date, and we do not undertake any duty to update any such statements. Today's presentation also includes references to non-GAAP financial measures. You should refer to the information contained in the company's third quarter results announcement for definitional information and reconciliations of non-GAAP measures to the comparable GAAP financial measures. Our earnings release can be found on our IR website, investors.teads.com, under News and Events. With that, let me turn the call over to David.

David Kostman

Thank you, Maria, and good morning, everyone. For the third quarter, ex-TAC gross profit reached approximately $94 million, adjusted EBITDA was a negative $8 million, and our free cash flow before interest payments was a negative $1.4 million. Let me break down the dynamics within our 2 core businesses, starting with Enterprise. Ex-TAC gross profit for the Enterprise business was $75 million, a decline of 14% year-over-year compared to a decline of just 6% in Q2 year-over-year. This sequential deceleration was primarily driven by an unexpectedly weak August in our EMEA region, influenced by macroeconomic factors and the structural headwinds in the open Internet. APAC experienced a 5% year-over-year increase in Q3, and North America a decline of 15%. However, as we move through the close of the quarter and into October, we began seeing tangible revenue improvements.

Our core growth engine, Connected TV, continues to perform well. CTV revenue grew 37% in Q3, continuing to outperform market growth rates, accounting for approximately 20% of our Enterprise business and reaching year-to-date revenues of nearly $100 million through Q3. Our focus on the home screen, or the front door to the living room, is paying off. What we see is that premium streaming video budgets are expanding, and we are seeking to capture that expansion by securing home screen inventory, in many instances, on an exclusive basis. We grew our leading global footprint of home screen placements of more than 500 million devices worldwide through expanded partnerships, including with Whale TV and Telly. Importantly, the CTV momentum is the hook that we expect to drive our broader omnichannel sales.

Third-party research data supports that combining CTV and web campaigns through Teads delivered a 25% increase in total campaign impact and a 10% lift -- and a 10-point lift in ad recall. We also recently launched the next evolution of our buying platform, Teads Ad Manager, which provides the opportunity to strengthen our partnership with major agencies who are actively consolidating their buying with partners that offer exclusive inventory, integrated data, and agentic planning. Teads Ad Manager leverages agentic workflows through MCP protocols and solves cross-channel fragmentation by bridging upper-funnel CTV branding with lower-funnel conversions in one agentic platform.

In the quarter, we also signed new joint business partnerships with global brands, including BMW, Lenovo, Shell, and Kia.

Turning now to our direct response and small-medium enterprise business. Ex-TAC gross profit was $20 million, a 50% decline year-over-year. Here, we are experiencing major headwinds due to the rapid adoption of AI-generated search summaries and algorithm updates that are significantly reducing traditional referral traffic across the open Internet. This is heavily impacting publisher page views and impressions and performance advertising across our entire ecosystem. The adoption of EngageOS, our new differentiated AI-powered platform, helps our publisher partners maximize yield and user engagement and potentially mitigate the impact of these search declines. Some of them already experienced double-digit growth in yields and user engagement. EngageOS also continues to support Teads' differentiation by securing access to direct, premium, authenticated supply. We are seeing continued traction of our solution with premium publishers, including Huffington Post, Le Monde and Prisma in France, Axel Springer in Germany, and Politico in the U.S. We're also continuing to bring on new premium publishers, including ABC News and Fandom in the U.S.

While Q3 was a challenging quarter, I want to frame our results around 3 key realities. One, CTV is our structural tailwind. Premium video budgets are expanding, and we are well positioned to capture them through our home screen global leadership and omnichannel offerings. Second, agencies are consolidating and prioritizing partners that can deliver scaled, integrated media paired with proprietary data assets, which is precisely where we hold a strong competitive edge. And third, the open Internet is facing unprecedented pressures due to traffic declines. While navigating this industry-wide traffic compression is difficult, we are providing tools publishers and advertisers can use to adapt and grow. For example, on the Enterprise side of the business, we're experimenting in emerging channels and formats to deliver on our clients' KPIs, such as in-app advertising using our native feed for more premium brand experiences, new social formats that complement walled garden environments, and LLM testing as part of the OpenAI ChatGPT pilot program.

Finally, despite the Q3 EBITDA loss, our free cash flow before interest was close to breakeven. We are driving operational efficiencies to improve our cash flow. We're also focused on optimizing our capital structure and expect to continue to engage in constructive discussions with our debtholders as we seek a long-term, stronger balance sheet.

Before we dive into the financials, I want to take a moment to address the leadership update we announced this morning. After 13 incredible years with Teads, Jason Kiviat will be transitioning from his role as Chief Financial Officer and support us throughout the transition period. On a very personal note, Jason has been an extraordinary partner, a trusted friend, and a key pillar of our company's success from our earliest days. We are deeply grateful for his dedication and wish him the absolute best in his next chapter.

I'm thrilled to welcome Michael Coyle as our new CFO. Michael brings a track record of driving operational excellence and financial discipline at major international organizations, and we believe he is the right leader to help us execute on our strategic priorities moving forward. Michael, welcome to the team.

I'll hand it to Jason for a few words.

Jason Kiviat

Thank you, David, and good morning, everyone. It has been a privilege to help build Teads over the last 13 years. I want to thank David, the executive team, the Board and especially my incredible finance team. Their hard work and resilience have been the backbone of our success. While it's never easy to step away, I'm confident in the foundation we've built. I look forward to working closely with Michael over the coming months to ensure a seamless handover, and I'm excited to watch Teads continue to evolve and succeed under his leadership.

Michael Coyle

Thank you, Jason and David, and I'll keep my remarks brief. I decided to join Teads because I have conviction in the future of the company. We are navigating a pivotal transformation, and I believe we have the underlying platform and strategic vision required to build a strong future. I'm excited to partner with David and the leadership team to drive this operational transformation forward, to build a resilient capital structure, and unlock the long-term value I see in the business. I look forward to connecting with many of you on the line in the weeks ahead.

Now, Jason, I'll turn it back to you.

Jason Kiviat

Thanks, Michael. As David noted, it was a challenging quarter where we saw a decline in our top-line revenues drive our adjusted EBITDA to be in a loss position. Revenue in Q3 was approximately $235 million, reflecting a 26% decline year-over-year, and ex-TAC gross profit in the quarter was $93.5 million, a decrease of 28% year-over-year. As the quarter played out, we saw a lower level of budget conversion than we expected at the onset of the quarter, ultimately resulting in a deterioration across both Enterprise and direct response and SME customers, despite the former showing momentum as we entered the quarter. In the early part of Q4, while we continue to see similar ecosystem trends, we have seen some recovery as compared with Q3 due both to operational improvements and seasonality.

Moving to expenses in Q3. As a result of recent declines in our share price and overall market capitalization, we were required under accounting standards to perform an impairment assessment and ultimately recorded a full impairment to goodwill of $272 million. This accounting adjustment is entirely noncash and does not impact our liquidity, operating cash flows, or debt covenants. Excluding the impact of this onetime noncash impairment charge, other cost of sales and operating expenses decreased around 10% year-over-year, even despite ongoing FX headwinds. While the cost reductions we've made have been helpful, given the headwinds on our top line and volatility of the environment, we're further scrutinizing our cost structure.

Based on the lower top-line performance and seasonality of the quarter, adjusted EBITDA for Q3 was a loss of $8 million, and free cash flow in the quarter was a use of cash of $33 million due to the semiannual interest payment made in August of $31 million. Free cash flow before interest payments was close to breakeven at negative $1.4 million.

Despite the use of cash, in part due to seasonality and timing of interest payments, we are comfortable with our liquidity position.

During the quarter, we closed on a new $125 million AR borrowing facility, leveraging a portion of our accounts receivable balances, providing a cost-efficient source of capital. The amount available under this facility will fluctuate based on borrowing base and various factors that influence it. At closing, the available borrowing base was approximately $60 million, with $55 million of cash drawn. As of September 30, we had total liquidity of approximately $140 million, inclusive of $90 million cash on hand and amounts under the AR facility and our existing revolving credit facility. Also, and as David said, we are focused on evaluation of our cost and opportunities to improve our capital structure.

Now, I'll turn it back to the operator for Q&A.

Operator

[Operator Instructions] Your first question comes from Laura Martin with Needham.

Preguntas y respuestas

Laura Martin

The first one, could you give us more granularity on what your traffic -- what you're seeing in terms of traffic declines, specifically that's driving the downdraft in revenue?

And then second, Jason or Mike, how much further can you go on cost-cutting? Because I know that's been a focus since you guys closed Teads. So how much further do you -- how many more costs do you think you can cut out of the enterprise at this point?

David Kostman

Laura, it's David. So we see anywhere from -- in page view declines, anywhere from 20% to, some of them, even 60% page view declines that are coming primarily from AI summaries and algorithmic changes. On top of that, there's also a more challenging environment to monetize. I mean, in the past, we used to offset a lot of it by better RPMs. We also see some increased challenges in better monetization. But what we've seen is a stabilization of that. So the page view declines, we think they've reached -- we hope they reached the bottom, and we're also seeing better monetization of existing pages through better algorithmic improvements on our end. So we think it's at the bottom, but these are the numbers that we see.

Jason Kiviat

Laura, it's Jason. In terms of your second question, yes, we have been -- we're down on cost maybe 10% year-over-year in Q3. But we do think there's more to go. I mean given obviously the context of the changes in the industry and the headwinds, it's something that we began looking at and we definitely think there's room to adjust our cost structure for this, as well as our balance sheet, as we said.

Operator

The next question comes from Ed Alter with Jefferies.

Edward Alter

I wanted to ask 2, if I can. One, just a little more on the overall macro. What would it take on the open Internet side for things to get better? Or how do you see them -- if you don't think they're going to get better, how are they going to get worse?

And then on CTV, it looks like that slowed a little bit from the past couple quarters. Just want to talk about the trends there and kind of how that's trending into the back half of the year.

David Kostman

It's David. So generally CTV has been a little bit of a slower quarter versus the previous one. But for example, October, we saw, again, acceleration. So we think it's pretty seasonal, and I think it impacted -- when you look at our overall results, we saw some weakness in Europe, particularly in August in a couple of countries. And as we said, I think we already see October sort of reversing that trajectory. Across the open Internet, we believe that -- I mean the 2 segments of the business are impacted very differently. The direct response and SME is impacted in a more severe way because we, on the feed product, have 100% that we need to fill. On the in-read and other placements, I think it's less of an impact because we still have opportunity to fill more than what we're filling today. And particularly on the Enterprise side, I think what we're seeing -- where we're seeing success is selling omnichannel. So leveraging the growth in CTV that we see to sell better packages that combine CTV home screen, where we have a real strong leadership position. We broadened that in Q3, as we updated. We have more than 500 million devices. We believe we're the only company that allows the big agencies to place campaigns across multiple OEMs on the home screen. And we, I think, are doing a much better job executing and packaging solutions which will combine that home screen with in-stream CTV and web.

Operator

There are no more questions at this time. I would like to transfer the call over to David Kostman for closing remarks. Please go ahead, sir.

David Kostman

Thank you for joining us. We look forward to updating you in the future, hopefully, with a better quarter than this one. Thank you.

Operator

Ladies and gentlemen, this concludes the conference call for today. Thank you for participating. You may now disconnect your lines.