"Too much risk there. I do fear that. Kind of like what happened with Trade Desk. You come in, you wake up and Google's there. I don't want Google to be coming in after me. And I think the margins are so good that who knows what will happen."
"AppLovin's numbers are genuinely impressive. The company's AXON 2 AI engine has driven an adjusted EBITDA margin of 84% in Q4 2025, up from 77% a year earlier. Free cash flow hit $1.309 billion in Q4 alone, up 88% year-over-year. For the full year, AppLovin generated $3.952 billion in free cash flow."
"The lesson isn't that TTD is a bad business. It's that even great ad tech businesses can get repriced violently when the competitive narrative shifts. You can read more about TTD's rocky road in our recent coverage of its recovery attempt."
AppLovin operates as an AI-driven advertising platform with impressive financial metrics, including an 84% adjusted EBITDA margin in Q4 2025 and $3.952 billion in annual free cash flow. However, Jim Cramer warns that these exceptional margins create vulnerability to competition from larger players, particularly Google. Google's massive scale, $402.8 billion in trailing revenue, and 32.8% profit margin position it to disrupt the ad tech space if it chooses. The Trade Desk serves as a cautionary example—despite maintaining 95% customer retention and growing to $2.896 billion in revenue, its stock fell 56% over the past year when competitive dynamics shifted. AppLovin's success may inadvertently invite predatory competition from tech giants seeking to capture lucrative advertising markets.
Read at 24/7 Wall St.
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