The news: Google and Meta have won a series of legal victories that show the ad duopoly’s market position is as solid as ever.

• Google will not have to break up its ad business as a result of an April ruling declaring it a monopoly, a US District Court judge ruled Thursday. The US Department of Justice wanted Google to sell off AdX and DoubleClick, the foundations of its market-leading ad exchange.
• Just last week, Meta similarly sidestepped an overhaul: The tech and advertising giant reached a $17 billion settlement, including minor design adjustments, with 47 states that alleged its addictive design features harmed teens.

Why it matters: Google’s monopoly ruling set the stage for a wave of major antitrust enforcement that threatened to crack its market dominance. But this week’s ruling suggests a shakeup may not come to pass, or at least will be a slow roll.

It’s not just the US where efforts have dampened. Global regulatory efforts like the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) have led to fines like TikTok’s $600 million penalty, but they are a drop in the bucket against these companies’ billions in revenues. (TikTok parent ByteDance had profits of $50 billion in 2025, per Bloomberg.)

Other regional regulations pose more meaningful changes—California may pass a bill ending video autoplay on social platforms, threatening engagement—but trust-busting is stalling.

Implications for marketers: The status quo of digital advertising will remain—at least for now. Marketers can expect to use leading ad exchanges and platforms for the foreseeable future as regulatory action slows down.

Change is still happening, but on a slower scale: Google’s share of search ad revenues is waning somewhat, falling below 50% this year as pressure from Amazon, Walmart, and others mounts.

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