In this week’s Week in Charts, The Trade Desk’s Jeff Green on competitors’ “lack of objectivity”, HBO Max sees ad tier growth, and Gen Z are a minority on Insta and TikTok.
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Charts of the Week
Instagram and TikTok Users Aren’t Getting Any Younger
Despite Instagram and TikTok’s association with younger users, the 18-24 demographic makes up the second-smallest audience on both platforms, according to EMARKETER analysis of Comscore data. The largest age group on TikTok and Instagram are 25-34 year-olds, accounting for around 22 percent of users on both apps. And while TikTok audiences do skew younger, Instagram’s share of 65+ users (12.2 percent) is only slightly smaller than 18-24s (12.7 percent).
Digital Ad Growth is Offsetting Print Declines at NYT
The New York Times’ ad revenues climbed 11 percent YoY in Q2 2026, as digital growth offsets ongoing declines on the print side of the business. Meredith Kopit Levien, CEO of The New York Times, noted that video is “playing a relatively minor role in the growth in advertising so far,” but the publisher is heavily focused on scaling video production, engagement and monetisation.
S4 Capital Stock Hits 52-Week High
S4 Capital’s share price reached a 52-week high on Thursday after the marketing group posted record profits for the first half of the year, and raised its full-year profit margin forecast. The uptick follows a period of decline for the UK-based group, which has issued a series of profit warnings over the last few years due to geopolitical turmoil and diminished spend from tech clients.
Marketers Are Coordinating TV with Social Media for Holiday Campaigns
Marketers are “actively coordinating TV with the rest of the media mix” for holiday campaigns, according to tvScientific, with 74 percent using the channel alongside social media. The report noted that this approach mirrors consumer behaviour, as 46 percent of consumers say they are more likely to buy if they have seen the brand on social media before seeing it on TV. “That’s why the strongest seasonal strategies do not treat TV as an isolated channel or each shopping moment as a separate campaign,” said the report. “They connect both.”
The Week in Stocks
Agencies
Last week’s earnings saw significant gains for S4 Capital (see chart above) and WPP, whose turnaround efforts appear to be starting to take hold.
TV
Paramount Skydance’s share price jumped after the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) approved the media company’s proposed $110 billion acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD), clearing a major regulatory hurdle for the merger.
Publishers
Shares in The New York Times slipped on Wednesday despite strong revenue performance in Q2 (see chart above), seemingly owing to concerns over a slowdown in subscriber growth.
Ad Tech
The Trade Desk stock hit a 52-week low on Monday following a disappointing earnings update for the ad tech business. “Our revenue growth is below our expectations and below the standard we hold ourselves to,” The Trade Desk CEO Jeff Green told investors.
Tech
Adobe’s stock price saw seven straight days of growth amid renewed investor interest in the company’s AI strategy.
