Trade Desk Handed CEO Jeffrey Green Options on 7 Million Shares Weeks Before Tonight’s Earnings
Trade Desk's stock is surging into tonight's earnings, but the Form 4 filings tell a quieter story about what executives did this fall. Hundreds of ETFs own the stock, and some of your holdings may be doubling up without you…
Shares of Trade Desk (NASDAQ:TTD | TTD Price Prediction) were up 16.28% at $15.04 as of 12:23 p.m. ET Monday. The company reports third-quarter results after the close tonight. For ETF investors, the more important story is in this fall’s Form 4s. The board granted CEO Jeffrey Green options on 7 million shares in September. In October, options across the C-suite were reset.
Form 4 Trail Shows a 7 Million Share Grant, Then a Reset
On September 14, 2026, Green, listed as director, president and CEO, and 10% owner, acquired employee stock options covering 7,000,000 shares. The filing data shows a transaction price of $0.00, which is normal for a grant, and it does not give a strike price. Other executives received stock awards the same day: CFO Nathan Olmstead got 398,262 Class A shares, chief legal officer Jay Grant 398,262, COO Vivek Kundra 724,112 and chief accounting officer Tahnil Davis 217,233.
On October 19, Green, Olmstead, Kundra, Grant and Davis each reported giving up option blocks and receiving identical ones back. Green’s largest block was 737,028 options. That same day, shareholders approved the repricing of certain outstanding stock options at a special meeting. The repricing covers options previously granted to current service providers, including executive officers. The Wall Street Journal reported on the option rescue on Oct. 24. What hasn’t been widely reported is the size of the September grant to Green and how close it came to tonight’s report. Both the grant and the repricing were pay decisions. No executive bought shares on the open market.
Shareholders Got No Reset
Outside shareholders haven’t had their losses reset. The stock is down 67.23% over the past year, 60.38% year to date and 78.06% over five years. A $10,000 investment in rival AppLovin (NASDAQ:APP) three years ago is now worth $90,358. The same amount in Trade Desk is worth $1,654. At a market value of about $6.44 billion, the stock trades at roughly 13 times earnings with a free cash flow yield of 14.32%.
ETFs Carrying Trade Desk Into Tonight’s Report
In their latest N-PORT filings, 211 ETFs hold Trade Desk. The largest weight is in the Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight Communication Services ETF (NYSEARCA:RSPC), at 4.33% of the fund, or $2.4 million, as of July 31. Today’s move adds about 0.71 percentage point to the fund’s return, given that weighting. The actual figure will differ because the weighting changed as the stock price moved since July.
Exposure in the large core funds that many retirement savers own is much smaller. The Invesco S&P 500 Equal Weight ETF (NYSEARCA:RSP) held 0.18%, or $174.2 million, so today’s move adds about 0.03 percentage point. The iShares Core S&P 500 ETF (NYSEARCA:IVV) held 0.01%, or $106.2 million. Overlap is the risk to check. An investor who owns a cap-weighted S&P 500 fund, an equal-weight fund and a communication services sector fund holds Trade Desk three times. Equal-weight funds also rebalance by adding to laggards, so they keep buying into losers like Trade Desk.
Big quant funds were adding shares going into the summer. Two Sigma held 17,050,857 shares and D. E. Shaw 8,048,898. Both had added shares as of June 30.
What Tonight’s Report Needs to Show
Management guided third-quarter revenue to at least $650 million and adjusted EBITDA to about $160 million. Second-quarter figures were $715.06 million in revenue and $241.28 million in adjusted EBITDA. Analysts expect revenue of about $651.4 million and EPS of $0.2539. Ninety days ago, the EPS estimate was $0.4979, and it has had 17 down revisions in the past 30 days. Last quarter, adjusted EPS of $0.34 missed expectations of $0.40. Barron’s reported Monday that analysts don’t expect earnings to rescue Trade Desk’s “lost year”.
Olmstead set expectations low in August: “Visibility is somewhat more limited than in recent history and given that, we’re not assuming any meaningful improvement in the environment during the quarter.” Green said on that call, “Days like today hurt, but they make any comeback story more compelling.”
Watch whether revenue comes in above the $650 million floor. The fourth-quarter outlook matters too: the consensus is near $691.6 million. Tonight’s report is the first test since the reset. Executives with new and repriced options profit only if the stock rises from here. ETF holders, meanwhile, have already absorbed the full decline.
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Jake has been been working in financial media for almost 15 years. He focuses on all things personal finance for 24/7 Wall St. with high hopes to educate and entertain. Most recently, Jake spent 12 years working various roles at The Motley Fool. He started copy editing fool.com content, worked on premium and marketing campaigns, and helped launch The Ascent, a personal finance brand.
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