The lead  ·  01

Stagwell Now Owns Freestar’s Monetization Stack, Not Its Publishers. What Changes for 1,000-Plus Sites

Stagwell announced on Monday 26 October that it has bought Freestar’s technology, services and client relationships, not the publishers in the network. The price was not disclosed.

Also on the wire

The week in one paragraph

This was the week buyers moved closer to supply and platforms kept redrawing who gets into the auction. Stagwell closed its purchase of Freestar’s technology, services and client relationships, not the publishers themselves, which gives a holding company a network of more than 1,000 sites to curate from. After Apple’s Safari block, ID5 is testing server-side identity, which its CEO says larger publishers can finish in days and smaller ones that outsource ad operations will find harder, while an AdExchanger column argued that a spyware ad running on more than 120,000 websites through vendors that sat on approved lists shows why the block looks different now. Amazon’s ad revenue grew 12% to $19.6 billion in the third quarter, down from 22% and 26% in the first two, with Andy Jassy blaming Prime Day timing and saying agentic shopping is no threat to ads yet. A Samsung Ads executive argued that CTV subscriber counts overstate reach, citing a finding that two of every three new NFL streamers left after the season. The week is thin and unbalanced: five stories, no more, with publishers on two, platforms on two, buyers on one and regulators on none. Publishers do not hold a majority.