OAREX Brings Credit Transparency to Digital Media, Ad Tech

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Feb 05, 2019, 13:46 ET

CLEVELAND, Feb. 5, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- Today OAREX released its Q4 credit and payments report on ad tech and digital media. The report is OAREX's role to the industry-wide effort of transparency, including payment data on 127 digital media firms and over 3,000 invoices purchased by OAREX.

Key highlights of the Q4 2018 report include:

38% of all payments received in 2018 were late;
Late payments declined in Q4 vs. the rest of the year (38% vs. 45%);
Payments late by more than 15 days doubled in December;
Mobile platforms are at the extreme with the best and worst payment performance;
Video platforms, and acquired firms, are always inconsistent or late to pay;
Average days by which firms pay late got longer – 9 days in Q4 vs. 6.5 days late for 2018;

Hanna Kassis, CEO of OAREX, says a payment delay by 9 days will require a firm to maintain 15-20% extra cash on hand. "Given how hard publishers are getting squeezed, this can ruin cash flow," said Kassis. If a digital media firm is looking to sign up with new demand partners, they have to ask the right questions. The answers are found in the report.

OAREX gets this info because they buy invoices from digital media firms. Since OAREX does not provide a loan, they do not take credit risk in their customers, per se. Instead, OAREX takes credit risk in the company that pays the invoice in 30, 60 or 90 days.

The internal debate to release data began after OAREX came across two now-defunct ad exchanges that were in financial trouble; information OAREX's clients found extremely useful. "We thought, why not release our payment data into the digital media ecosystem and help everyone out?" said Kassis. "Our publishers were extremely thankful, so it just made sense to give the info to everyone," he added.

That is what lead to the quarterly Digital Media Payments Report, offering detailed payment history by company, available for download on OAREX's blog.

OAREX, the Online Advertising Revenue Exchange, is backed by Arena Investors, LP of New York City, with offices in Cleveland and New York City. OAREX funding is available in the US, UK, Canada, Netherlands, Australia and MENA region. For more, visit www.oarex.com.

SOURCE OAREX Capital Markets, Inc.