The digital advertising industry’s recent public debutant, Direct Digital Holdings Inc. (DRCT) has been trending actively since its February IPO. While still down a huge 87.86% since its IPO, DRCT has been on a roller-coaster ride with sudden bouts of gains followed by losses. Most of the stock’s movement has been due to external factors as there has not been much news from the company.
Latest Happenings
The full-service programmatic advertising platform stock DRCT witnessed another upsurge yesterday. The recent upsurge has so far continued into today’s premarket thanks to the company’s latest earnings report. The company declared its Q4 and fiscal 2021 earnings yesterday, March 29, 2022.
At the time of writing, DRCT had increased by a good 36.82% in today’s premarket while it added 12.17% in the previous trading session. After closing yesterday’s session at $2.58 per share, the stock has thus reached a value of $3.53 in the premarket.
DRCT’s Q4 2021 Performance
According to March Walker, CEO of DRCT, the company executed exceptionally well in 2021 and is well-positioned for outperforming in the current year. The recent IPO along with the company’s debt refinancing has strengthened the company to effectively deploy operations in 2022.
The company reported the most welcomed revenue growth of over 95% YOY to $12.9 million in Q4 2021. Not only this, but the company also generated more operating cash ($0.6 million) in the quarter along with an improved EBITDA of $1.8 million. Comparatively, the year-ago quarter’s EBITDA stood at $1.8 million while net operating cash was $0.4 million.
On the other hand, DRCT’s net loss also increased to $2.1 million in the quarter against $0.5 million in Q4 2020.
Buy-side Advert Platform Update
Back in 2020, the company acquired Orange142, its buy-side advertising platform, which has so far been a meaningful addition to DRCT. Orange142 has recently further strengthened its 25-year relationship with Pigeon Forge. As announced on March 9, Orange142 has thus once again been declared as the digital agency of record for the Pigeon Forge Department of Tourism.
The mountain town and vacation spot in eastern Tennessee witnessed an economic impact of over $2 billion from tourism in 2021. Currently, the next 5-year plan is to further increase the uptick in its tourism.
How Does the Future Look?
With the anticipation of continued growth, DRCT expects revenue of $11.0-$11.5 million for Q1 2022 with an increase of 98% YOY. While planning to revise and further improve throughout the year, the company provided a fiscal 2022 revenue outlook of $48.0-$52.0 million. This translates to a YOY improvement of 31%.
The company’s 2022 revenue guidance beat the analyst’s expectations of $8.42 million for Q1 and $49.24 million for fiscal 2022.
