Google no longer deprecating third-party cookies – analysts weigh in

Google (NASDAQ:) announced on Tuesday it will no longer deprecate third-party cookies on Chrome.

While it continues to develop its Privacy Sandbox APIs, the company now plans to give users an “informed choice” regarding their web browsing settings, which can be adjusted at any time. The decision follows multiple delays, with the most recent timeline targeting full deprecation by early 2025.

“After several delays over the last ~4 years, and plenty of press surrounding a lack of testing/readiness on the part of publishers, advertisers, and ad tech vendors, we believe many in the industry were expecting this to be the end result,” analysts at Stifel commented.

“Admittedly, we’ve held the view that cookies would eventually be phased out, but felt relatively comfortable that the industry would be significantly more prepared this time around relative to Apple’s cookie deprecation efforts from several years ago,” they added.

More broadly, the analysts believe that retaining third-party cookies will benefit many industry players who were anticipated to suffer negative impacts, particularly smaller publishers.

Among their coverage, they highlight Criteo (CRTO) as the biggest beneficiary of this announcement, as cookie deprecation has been a major overhang for the company’s shares.

Analysts at BMO Capital Markets also highlighted CRTO as the net beneficiary, adding that The Trade Desk (NASDAQ:) also appears well-positioned with no deprecation.

“Specifically with UID2.0, we believe the signal loss will be muted, and advertisers will still generate attractive Return On Advertising Spend (ROAS),” analysts at BMO Capital Markets said.

“Recall that UID2.0 is The Trade Desk’s open-source Cookie replacement and effectively transforms an email address or phone number into an advertising identifier (UID2) that is not directly tied to the individual.”