The Trade Desk (TTD) fell 60% to $25 before surging 26% as OpenAI considers using it to sell ads and CEO Jeffrey Green bought $148M of stock. Amazon (AMZN) has encroached on market share.

OpenAI rolled out ChatGPT ads last month and is now looking to scale operations by partnering with an established player rather than building in-house.

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The Trade Desk (NASDAQ:TTD) had been largely left for dead by Wall Street investors over the past year. The ad-tech pioneer, once a high-flying darling of the programmatic advertising space, shed some 60% of its value as Amazon (NASDAQ:AMZN) increasingly encroached on its market share in retail media and connected TV (CTV). Slowing growth and a stretched valuation before the decline only compounded the pain.

Trading around $25 -- a loss of over three-quarters of its value from its all-time high hit in late 2024 -- the stock was surging in morning trading today, up around 26%. For the first time in months, it seems there is still hope for the future.

That hope is materializing fast on fresh reports that OpenAI is considering using The Trade Desk to sell ads, according to The Information. Just last month, OpenAI rolled out advertisements on ChatGPT for the first time, marking its initial foray into monetizing the platform beyond subscriptions. Now, the AI powerhouse is looking to scale those ad operations quickly -- and it appears open to partnering with an established player rather than building everything from scratch in-house.

READ: The analyst who called NVIDIA in 2010 just named his top 10 AI stocks

The potential collaboration would tap The Trade Desk’s sophisticated programmatic platform, giving OpenAI immediate access to brands, agencies, and sophisticated targeting tools across digital channels.

For The Trade Desk, which has watched its core growth decelerate amid intensifying competition, landing even an early-stage deal with one of the hottest names in tech could provide a much-needed shot of revenue momentum and credibility. Shares are exploding higher on the speculation alone, underscoring just how starved investors have been for positive catalysts.

Pouring gasoline on the fire, The Trade Desk CEO Jeffrey Terry Green just made a massive insider purchase of roughly $148 million worth of company stock. According to regulatory filings, Green bought approximately 6 million shares over several days this week at prices between about $23.49 and $25.08 per share.

Insider purchases are often viewed as one of the most bullish signals in the market. As legendary investor Peter Lynch famously noted, insiders can sell stock for any number of reasons -- diversification, taxes, personal liquidity -- but they typically buy for only one: they believe the price is going higher.

What makes Green’s move especially noteworthy is that it represents the first significant insider purchase at The Trade Desk in well over a year, coming after a prolonged period of selling or inactivity from executives. The timing, right as the OpenAI talks surfaced, sends a powerful message of confidence from the very top.

The OpenAI opportunity, if it materializes, would clearly be helpful to The Trade Desk. A partnership could accelerate revenue growth, expand The Trade Desk's footprint into the exploding AI-advertising arena, and restore some of the premium valuation the stock once commanded. Yet any celebration should be tempered. OpenAI has signaled it ultimately wants to bring more ad operations in-house over time, meaning any Trade Desk role might prove temporary rather than a permanent growth engine.

Meanwhile, Amazon continues advancing its own retail media and connected-TV ambitions, chipping away at Trade Desk's traditional advantages. Broader AI advancements could also automate or disrupt large swaths of the programmatic ad space that The Trade Desk currently dominates.

While today’s surge offers a short-term respite for long-suffering shareholders, I’d be leery of buying The Trade Desk despite the excitement. The fundamental competitive pressures haven’t vanished, and this pop feels more like relief than a sustainable turnaround signal.

Investors should watch whether the OpenAI talks translate into actual revenue or remain just another headline. Until clearer proof emerges that the Trade Desk can defend its moat long-term, the resurrection may prove fleeting.

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