What happened

Shares of programmatic advertising company The Trade Desk (TTD 3.35%) jumped on Tuesday, rising about 6.8% by the time the market closed. Shares were up as much as 9.8% during the trading day.

The stock's sharp increase is likely primarily driven by big gains in the broader market, particularly among growth stocks. But news of The Trade Desk's strategic integration with sell-side ad tech company FreeWheel's unified decisioning capability for connected television (CTV) may have helped the stock as well.

A chart showing a stock price moving higher

Image source: Getty Images.

So what

Showing how upbeat the overall market was on Tuesday, the S&P 500 closed the day up nearly 3.1%. Furthermore, many growth stocks, including Shopify, Amazon, and more, saw outsize gains. This broader-market momentum undoubtedly helped propel The Trade Desk stock higher.

Additionally, Comcast (CMCSA -0.37%) company FreeWheel said in a press release Tuesday that it is now making its technology for unifying both direct and programmatic connected TV inventory widely available since it is moving from a pilot to being "fully operational with enhanced functionality."  

Included in the pilot program for FreeWheel's unified yield product, The Trade Desk CEO Jeff Green has already been raving in the company's earnings calls about this new technology's impact on bringing to market more connected CTV inventory for ad buyers. The tool has increased The Trade Desk platform's access to CTV inventory by 300%, the tech company confirmed in FreeWheel's press release on Tuesday.

Also notable, Krishan Bhatia, head of business operations and strategy for NBCUniversal (a Comcast TV entertainment publisher), said on Tuesday in an interview with Adweek that the publisher is considering making its new Peacock streaming service's inventory available programmatically after it has perfected the user experience and demonstrated the ability to run high-quality ad campaigns. 

Now what

There's no doubt that CTV is gaining rapid momentum as a key channel for programmatic advertising. As the world's largest demand-side platform, The Trade Desk is well positioned to benefit from what will likely be a surge in CTV inventory and revenue in 2020.