(News Bulletin 247) – The advertising group published growth above expectations and raised its revenue growth target, which the market completely or almost ignored this Tuesday. The CEO, Arthur Sadoun, tried to explain to analysts how much artificial intelligence will boost (and is already boosting) his company’s business.

Publicis represents a relatively rare market paradox. The advertising group, led and chaired by Arthur Sadoun, has continued to publish growth above expectations, raise its objectives and cut corners from its competitors.

Over the first nine months of 2025, Publicis won contracts, totaling $6 billion, in net figures (client gains less losses) of new billings, according to data compiled by JPMorgan. Its closest rival, Interpublic Group, is relegated to light years away ($800 million), while all the others (Dentsu, Omnicom, WPP) are in the red.

However, its action is lagging behind, falling by 18.4% over the whole of 2025, when the CAC 40 gains 6.8%.

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Good numbers…

Again this Tuesday, October 14, Publicis delivered solid activity in the third quarter, with like-for-like revenue growth of 5.7% when the consensus (the average analyst forecast) was 5.2%, according to Oddo BHF. The company was driven by the 7.1% like-for-like increase in activity in the “North America” zone.

As with the previous publication, Publicis has once again raised its growth target for the current financial year, counting on an increase of 5 to 5.5% on a comparable basis, compared to an increase “close” to 5% previously. During a conference with analysts, Arthur Sadoun assured that reaching the bottom of the range was assured and that the company was “aiming” for the top of this same range.

Conclusion of Oddo BHF: “the trend therefore remains very good and Publicis’ market share gains continue”. The research office confirms its opinion at “outperformance” and recalls that the group is one of its favorite stocks in Europe.

UBS said more or less the same thing, appreciating a “strong beat” (a solid outperformance compared to expectations) as well as the optimistic comment on 2026. Arthur Sadoun explained that the company now had more visibility for next year thanks to its contract wins. Publicis therefore intends to outperform the market in 2026 for the seventh consecutive year.

…Which hardly impress the stock market

And yet the market pays little attention to these very good figures and these comments. Publicis shares certainly opened up almost 2% but quickly returned their gains to stabilize at a level close to balance.

In the opinion of several analysts, this very lukewarm reaction from investors can be explained by two letters: IA.

For several months now, the markets have been nervous about the advertising agency sector, fearing that it will be disrupted by artificial intelligence. Moreover, when its half-year results were published last July, Publicis shares fell 6.7% despite good copy.

If some analysts had pointed out rather negative comments on Sapient, the digital services subsidiary of Publicis, others explained that Arthur Sadoun’s statements could have fueled market fears by evoking “disruptions in the advertising sector”.

“AI risks appear to be holding back investments in the agency sector in general, and at Publicis in particular,” observed UBS in July.

“While we recognize that new technologies have increased uncertainty, we are not convinced by the arguments according to which AI represents a major risk for the organic growth of Publicis, in particular over the next two years,” however qualified the Swiss bank.

At the end of September, Bank of America noted “concerns related to AI which have further increased”.

“AI continues to dominate conversations with investors. Sentiment remains gloomy, as evidenced by stock fluctuations following the announcement of the Palo Alto Network’s launch of a marketing campaign entirely based on AI. In addition, Amazon launched a creative assistant designed to help advertisers produce advertising campaigns using AI”, developed the American bank.

A market education exercise

Aware that the market must be reassured and educated, Arthur Sadoun deployed impressive energy during this Tuesday’s conference call to convince investors.

“If there is one idea that you should take away from this call, it is that we are winning today thanks to AI,” insisted Arthur Sadoun.

The manager indicated that marketing budget spending had not slowed down in the third quarter, and assured that there was a “boom”, “an acceleration” in demand for the group’s AI products and services.

Arhtur Sadoun judged that the group was well positioned to meet this growing demand thanks to the approximately 12 billion euros of investments made over the last decade in data (in particular via the acquisition of the company Epsilon in 2019), technologies and AI.

The manager explained that with its AI offering, Publicis had gleaned new contracts without even having to make a “pitch” (commercial arguments to simplify).

Arthur Sadoun cited several examples that allow Publicis to differentiate itself and even expand its potential market. In the media division, the company used AI to connect Epsilon data to a network of social media influencers to create “the largest and most powerful platform” of influencers, while also linking it to e-commerce sites. According to him, this platform allows customers to have the same “reach” (the potential audience) as during the Super Bowl in the United States and those for “a fraction of the cost”.

Arthur Sadoun explained that its AI tools made it possible to have a detailed measurement of the effectiveness of advertising content, then allowing clients to make appropriate decisions based on their customers.

Furthermore, the CEO also observed a growing demand for AI agent networks, while the subsidiary Sapient has developed a platform in this area, called “Bodhi”. This is why this subsidiary experienced positive growth in the third quarter, despite customers’ wait-and-see attitude in digital transformation spending. Arthur Sadoun also judged that once customers emerge from this “wait and see” attitude and start investing again, Sapient would be well positioned to return to robust growth.

The manager also gave figures: 80% of the media division’s revenues include AI, a proportion which rises to a third for “creativity” and 100% for “technology”. Either way, just under three-quarters of the company’s revenue incorporates AI, based on this guidance.

However, mayonnaise is having difficulty catching on with investors. At least for now. “Investors don’t want to go there,” observes a financial intermediary who nevertheless judges that Arthur Sadoun’s “call” was good, as was Publicis’ publication.

“The markets still don’t believe it, Publicis’ persuasion business must continue,” says an analyst.