Bloomberg report: Amazon gets some blame in global ad industry’s 24-Hour, $5 billion rout

| | No Comments

MADISON-AVENUE-WOES.jpg

The world’s biggest advertising companies have lost more than $5 billion of their market value in 24 hours and Amazon.com Inc. is getting some of the blame, according to a report on bloomberg.com.

The market rout began Wednesday around midday in New York and spread around the globe after Paris-based Publicis Groupe SA said fourth-quarter sales fell unexpectedly because of a decline in business with consumer goods brands in the U.S. Publicis shares lost as much as 15 percent, their biggest intraday drop since the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks in the U.S.

Shares in its biggest rivals shed between 4 and 9 percent as the implications for the wider industry sank in. If consumer goods makers had less need of Publicis, the same may apply to WPP Plc, Omnicom Group Inc., Dentsu Inc. and Interpublic Group of Cos. After all, Publicis has been seen as an early mover in shifting to the new digitally-driven advertising that’s supposed to keep corporate marketing departments loyal to the old ad firms.