Wall St. Speaks Out on Nielsen, BrightRoll and Twitter

Madison & Wall: For Nielsen, A Panel Is A Source Designed By A Committee - Brian Wieser, Pivotal Research Group

For Nielsen, A Panel is a Source Designed by a Committee

Yesterday morning, at the same time as Viacom was arguing it would work (seemingly in parallel) towards "implementing an industry standard that appropriately reflects (Viacom's) valuable and rapidly growing multi-platform viewership," a Nielsen executive published an article arguing much the same thing. Viacom's CEO went on to say (seemingly in parallel) that it would also move aggressively toward non-Nielsen-dependent advertising monetization. While Viacom's displeasure with Nielsen was clear – and is far from unique – we share the view expressed by Nielsen that what gets transacted is largely determined by the industry, both buyers and sellers. Changing those measures is hard, and resulting outputs invariably flawed, perhaps what one might expect from something that is designed by a committee that needs to find a consensus against which competing buyers and sellers can agree upon.

BrightRoll is a Positive for Yahoo, But Still More to Do

Yahoo announced this week that it is buying video platform company BrightRoll for $640mm in cash. As we wrote last month when related reports emerged, BrightRoll is emblematic of the kind of acquisition Yahoo should pursue, given the traction it has within the industry and the alignment it has with the priorities of large advertisers. While we view the transaction positively, we note challenges still follow, not least as integration and more acquisitions are probably still needed.

Twitter Investor Day Take-Aways

Twitter hosted an Analyst Day this week. Overall, we were positive about the event if only because it provided most investors with more color than they would have previously had. Incremental data such as the number of advertisers the company has were particularly useful. Investors will probably also look at raised margin expectations favorably, too. However, while managerial focus and initiatives were positive in and of themselves, assessing commentary more fully requires additional context, both vs. Twitter's efforts at this time last year and those of its competitors. Given our prior research on the company, our assumptions and forecasts are unchanged at this time.

REPORT INCLUDING DISCLOSURES CAN BE FOUND HERE: Madison and Wall 11-14-14.pdf

Brian Wieser is a Senior Analyst at Pivotal Research Group, where he covers securities which areimpacted by the advertising economy, including Facebook, Google, Yahoo, Interpublic, Omnicom, WPP, Publicis, Nielsen, CBS, Viacom and Discovery Communications. Brian can be reached at brian@pvtl.com.

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