How the Middle East Became the Latest ‘Gold Rush’ in Marketing

Saudi Arabia’s fledgling advertising industry and continued growth in the sector in the United Arab Emirates are helping to make the marketing business in the Middle East the fastest-growing in the world.

Ad spending in the Middle East is projected to increase 8.1% to $6.6 billion this year, up from 3.5% last year, according to advertising research firm WARC.

That expansion is building from a much smaller base than in many other ad markets. The Netherlands alone will generate $6 billion in ad spending in 2024, up about 2.3%, WARC said. But it is also enough to outpace every other region in 2024, the firm said.

“It reminds me almost of the gold rush,” said Reda Raad , chief executive of TBWA\Raad Group, an ad agency based in Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates, that is part of the U.S.-based ad holding company Omnicom Group . “I don’t think we’re going to see this type of growth again in our lifetime.” TBWA\Raad has won eight new clients over the past year, with an increase in head count of 17% to accommodate the new work, Raad said.

Some international brands have long maintained a presence in the region. PepsiCo has considered the area a strategic market for decades, said Karim Elfiqi , senior vice president and chief marketing officer at PepsiCo Africa, Middle East and South Asia. Sponsorship deals with local stars such as Mohamed Salah , a soccer player from Egypt, “are a testimony of how over time, we have been part of the cultural fabric of the region,” Elfiqi said.

Other major brands have formed a more recent focus on the Middle East. The Lego Group opened a Middle East and Africa headquarters in Dubai in 2019, citing the size of the region’s young population. That office has developed work such as a Ramadan-themed campaign that ran in the U.A.E. and Saudi Arabia, among other locations.

‘Massive growth’

The Middle East’s ad market has lagged behind regions such as North America and Europe partly because of stricter cultural norms and regulations that affected business, as did a more limited media landscape and economic instability, according to Raad.

But marketing growth in the region is now being driven in part by newfound marketing interest in Saudi Arabia, where ad spending this year is expected to reach $2.1 billion, nearly double its level in 2019, according to WARC. Growth is also coming from the U.A.E., whose ad market is expected to reach $1.7 billion in 2024. Smaller contributors include Qatar and Kuwait.

The landscape has changed now because of economic diversification, increased connectivity and a move into the digital world, leading international brands to enter and invest in campaigns tailored to the region, Raad said.

Four years ago, Saudi Arabia made up a small proportion of business at Lightblue, a creative experience and tech agency based in Dubai. These days, 40% of its business comes from the country, says co-founder David Balfour , who opened an office in Riyadh last month as a result.

“The conversation used to be, ‘We’re going to do this in Dubai.’ Now, it’s ‘We’re going to do this in Dubai—and in Saudi.’” Balfour said. “We’re seeing massive growth in that region.”

There have been speed bumps. As government spending reaches huge levels , Saudi Arabia experienced a rare economic contraction in 2023.

But the country’s efforts to expand its economic pursuits beyond oil have led to the creation of new brands, which are seeking the help of marketing agencies to get the word out.

Marketers in the region are seeking help to stay on-trend in areas such as generative artificial intelligence and social media, said Greg Paull , principal of R3, a consulting firm that helps match advertisers with agencies.

“U.A.E. has been a magnet for the region for 20 years as more investment has come in—but with the new leadership in Saudi since 2017 [when Mohammed bin Salman was named crown prince ], this market has gone through remarkable growth,” Paull said.

Saudi Arabia has faced criticism for its human-rights record under the crown prince, the day-to-day ruler of the kingdom, especially over the 2018 killing of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi and the more recent jailing of women’s rights activists.

Mohammed has outlasted the international isolation that followed Khashoggi’s killing, however, and continues to pursue an economic diversification plan dubbed Vision 2030. The country last year unveiled plans for a new international airline called Riyadh Air, is investing billions of dollars to build its tourism and videogame industries, and in March hosted a golf tournament in Jeddah under the auspices of LIV Golf, the Saudi-backed league that has both challenged the PGA Tour and struck a deal to unify with it.

Changing tides

Vision 2030 also calls women’s empowerment a top social priority and seeks to increase the country’s employment rate of women.

Nada Hakeem , CEO and co-founder of Saudi creative agency Wetheloft, said the perceptions of hardships for women in the marketing and advertising industry are outdated and inaccurate.

“As a Saudi woman who founded my company in 2012, I’ve always felt supported by the creative community and the industry as a whole,” Hakeem said. “While every society may have its challenges, I can confidently say that these challenges have not hindered our growth.”

A progression of new laws, policies and incentives are making the industry in Saudi Arabia more inclusive and supportive for women, she added.

In certain parts of the Middle East, “absolutely, it’s still challenging, but they are making the right strides, and they have the right quotas and ambitions in place,” said Rebecca Bezzina , CEO for the EMEA region at R/GA, an agency owned by Interpublic Group of Cos.

“They’ve got wealth, they’ve got world-class ambition, world-class budget. They’re not shy of doing things in the right way,” Bezzina added, speaking of the region overall. “But they still have a talent shortage, especially from a creative and design and product point of view. So often what we’ve found our success has been that they’ve come to us and said, ‘Oh, we want a world-class agency to help us launch this new venture or do this new brand.’”

R/GA said it sees 69% more requests for agency work from marketers in the region today than it did five years ago. It recently handled a brand redesign for Banque Saudi Fransi, which wanted to reaffirm its Saudi roots with a modern identity, and created Weyay, the brand for a new digital bank from the National Bank of Kuwait.

The agency hasn’t notably increased its regional workforce, but it has made changes to facilitate working across Europe and the Middle East.

Other Western players are making moves to capture a piece of the growth. Advertising giant WPP has long worked in Saudi Arabia through units such as Ogilvy and GroupM, but in 2021 established a joint venture with a local company to create ICG Saudi Arabia, a communications and media company based in Saudi Arabia. Ad holding company Stagwell opened new offices for its media agency Assembly in Riyadh in 2021 and in Cairo in 2022.

Regional hospitality

Some executives said certain facets of business dealings in the Middle East are different than in other parts of the world.

Bertrand Morin, a group account director for R/GA who is based in London and works often with Middle Eastern clients, said he spends much more time speaking about personal lives and families with those clients than those in the U.K. or U.S. He has been invited to Middle Eastern clients’ homes to join their families for dinner, something that has never happened with clients elsewhere.

But others say it can feel surprisingly familiar.

Balfour, the Lightblue co-founder, said he was struck by the number of ad-agency workers recently having dinner at the Riyadh location of steakhouse chain Beefbar, and the scene’s similarity to far-off locations.

“The staff are from everywhere in the world. The service and the food is unbelievable. There’s a DJ playing,” Balfour said. “Apart from not having alcohol, you could be anywhere in the world.”

Reporting season has once again reminded investors that a strong profit does not guarantee a rising share price, and a large loss does not always trigger a sell-off. What matters most is how each result compares with expectations and, increasingly, what management says about the year ahead. During the August 2026 season, companies offering credible turnarounds or unexpectedly strong guidance were rewarded handsomely, while those flagging weaker margins, slowing demand or greater uncertainty were punished.

The following ranking draws on Morningstar’s review of 164 ASX-listed companies and measures each company’s share-price movement on the day it reported. This captures the market’s immediate response to the earnings announcement, before subsequent economic developments, dividends and company-specific news cloud the picture. Here are the five biggest winners, and the five hardest-hit losers, of the season so far.

The five winners

1. Bapcor (ASX:BAP): +41.0%

Bapcor delivered reporting season’s largest relief rally after presenting early evidence that its troubled automotive-parts business was stabilising. Although underlying revenue fell 1.8% to $1.92 billion and underlying NPAT collapsed 85% to $10.8 million, underlying EBITDA of $152.5 million exceeded guidance.

More importantly, working-capital initiatives released $68.5 million in the second half, lifting cash conversion to 109.4% and reducing net debt by 63% to $135 million. The statutory loss was $431.6 million, largely because of non-cash impairments. Investors focused on improving operational momentum, stronger liquidity and management’s expectation of modest FY27 revenue growth.

2. Zip Co (ASX:ZIP): +18.2%

Zip comfortably surpassed its FY26 targets, sending the buy-now-pay-later provider’s shares sharply higher. Transaction volume rose 23% to $16.7 billion, while cash earnings before tax, depreciation and amortisation jumped 58% to a record $268.9 million. Statutory profit climbed 46% to $116.4 million, and the cash operating margin expanded by 4.2 percentage points to 20%.

The strongest signal was guidance for FY27 cash earnings of $340 million—around 26% growth and above analysts’ forecasts. US transaction volume increased 42.5% and now represents three-quarters of group volume, offsetting weaker customer activity in Australia.

3. CSL (ASX:CSL): +17.3%

CSL’s result was hardly spectacular in isolation, but it cleared a market bar that had fallen dramatically following earlier downgrades and restructuring announcements. Underlying NPATA was US$3.1 billion, down 2% in constant-currency terms, while operating cash flow reached US$3.51 billion.

CSL maintained its full-year dividend at US$2.92 per share and completed a A$1 billion buyback. The real catalyst was FY27 guidance for approximately 5% underlying profit growth, compared with market expectations closer to 2%. After an extended period of earnings disappointments, investors interpreted the outlook as evidence that CSL’s core plasma business was approaching a sustainable recovery.

4. Judo Capital (ASX:JDO): +16.9%

Judo Capital demonstrated strong operating leverage as its specialist business-lending franchise expanded. Full-year profit before tax rose 34% to $168.1 million, while pre-provision profit increased 42%. Gross loans and advances grew 18% to $14.7 billion, reaching the top of the bank’s guidance range and comfortably exceeding broader system growth.

Deposits increased 24% to $12.2 billion, return on equity improved by 1.1 percentage points to 6.4%, and earnings per share rose 29% to 9.9 cents. Reaffirmation of the FY27 outlook gave investors confidence that loan growth could continue without sacrificing margins or credit quality.

5. Super Retail Group (ASX:SUL): +15.8%

The owner of Supercheap Auto, rebel, BCF and Macpac reported record sales of $4.2 billion, up 3.2%, despite cautious discretionary spending. Profitability went backwards: normalised profit before tax fell 7% to $306 million and normalised NPAT declined 2.8% to $226 million as transformation spending weighed on margins. Nevertheless, the result exceeded subdued expectations, online sales grew 5.3% and membership across the group’s loyalty programs reached 13.1 million. Investors were also encouraged by positive early FY27 trading, stable gross margins and continued market-share gains. A fully franked 33-cent final dividend added to the appeal.

The five losers

1. Hansen Technologies (ASX:HSN): –21.2%

Hansen’s historic result met expectations, but investors recoiled from its outlook. The utility and communications software provider achieved an underlying EBITDA margin of 31%, exceeding its 30% target, while generating strong cash flow. However, management designated FY27 an “investment and transition year”, signalling a roughly five-percentage-point margin contraction as spending on products, sales capabilities and organisational changes increased.

Revenue had already been broadly flat, leaving investors concerned that the investment program would depress earnings before new growth appeared. Leadership changes, including the chief executive’s departure, added uncertainty. Management expects revenue growth and margins above 30% to return in FY28, but the market was unwilling to wait.

2. Life360 (ASX:360): –19.4%

Life360’s headline growth was impressive: quarterly revenue rose 38% to US$159 million, subscription revenue increased 31%, and adjusted EBITDA climbed 53% to US$31.1 million. Monthly active users reached 102.4 million and paying circles grew 27% to 3.2 million. The sell-off reflected expectations rather than a collapsing business.

Net income fell 18%, the net margin contracted from 6% to 3%, hardware shipments dropped 18%, and full-year EBITDA guidance was merely maintained. After a strong valuation run, investors wanted a larger upgrade and clearer evidence that heavy investment in advertising, international expansion and artificial intelligence would generate additional earnings.

3. PEXA Group (ASX:PXA): –17.0%

PEXA reported a 7% increase in continuing-operations revenue and 12% EBITDA growth to $152 million, accompanied by a two-percentage-point margin expansion. Free cash flow increased 39%, suggesting the core Australian electronic-conveyancing platform remained highly profitable. Investors instead concentrated on management’s warning that property-transfer volumes could decline, alongside regulatory uncertainty surrounding the fees PEXA can charge.

The company is also continuing to invest heavily in its loss-making international expansion. Morningstar considered the market reaction excessive, arguing that structural transfer-volume assumptions had not materially changed, but the combination of softer near-term activity and regulatory risk overwhelmed the respectable headline numbers.

4. SEEK (ASX:SEK): –14.3%

SEEK produced solid FY26 figures, including 10% revenue growth to $1.20 billion, a 15% rise in EBITDA and 28% growth in adjusted earnings per share. It also lifted its fully franked annual dividend by 13% to a record 52 cents. Those achievements were overshadowed by falling paid job-ad volumes and cautious FY27 assumptions.

The statutory accounts included a $201 million loss from the SEEK Growth Fund and $377 million of significant items, making the headline result considerably less attractive. Investors were particularly concerned that economic weakness could limit volumes while the company continued investing in platform integration and artificial-intelligence products.

5. JB Hi-Fi (ASX:JBH): –12.3%

JB Hi-Fi’s full-year result was broadly respectable, with group sales rising 5% to $11.1 billion and underlying earnings per share increasing 6% to $4.48. The damage came from its current-trading update. Australian sales were almost flat during the June quarter and deteriorated further in July, while earnings in the core Australian electronics business fell 3.6%.

Housing-related categories were particularly weak as higher living costs and interest rates constrained household budgets. With JB Hi-Fi entering the season on a demanding valuation, an in-line historic result was not sufficient: the loss of sales momentum prompted investors to rapidly reduce their expectations for FY27.

Overall, the season showed that share prices react less to whether profits rose or fell than to the gap between results and expectations. Bapcor was rewarded for being less troubled than feared, while several fundamentally profitable companies were punished because their outlooks failed to justify elevated valuations.