What happened
Shares of Taboola (TBLA 4.76%) soared 56% this past week, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence, after the advertising company struck a blockbuster deal with Yahoo!.
So what
Under the terms of the agreement, Taboola will serve as Yahoo!'s exclusive digital advertising partner across its websites. Taboola will run the native ads on Yahoo!'s properties spanning news, sports, finance, and more that collectively reach nearly 900 million monthly active users.
As part of the deal, Yahoo! will also receive a roughly 25% equity stake in Taboola and a seat on the ad company's board of directors.
"Yahoo! is an internet pioneer, representing one of the largest, most trusted, and most sophisticated publishers in the world," Taboola CEO Adam Singolda said in a press release. "Everywhere I look, I see a rocket ship growth opportunity for both of us -- native, e-commerce, video, header bidding (display), and more."
The transaction is projected to close in the first quarter of 2023, subject to shareholder and regulatory approval. Taboola expects the partnership to be "highly accretive" to its revenue and free cash flow post-closing.
Now what
The agreement would cement Taboola's position as a leading native advertising platform at a time when advertisers and publishers are searching for new ways to monetize their sites. The impact of Apple's privacy changes on Facebook's and other social media sites' ad-targeting abilities, along with Google's plans to reduce its reliance on cookies to power its data-collection efforts, are forcing marketers to seek out effective alternatives. Taboola is emerging as one such option. Investors, in turn, are bidding up its stock price to reflect its improved prospects in the digital ad arena.
