Elon Musk’s X and the advertising trade group the World Federation for Advertisers (WFA) have settled their legal dispute after nearly two years, the organizations said Wednesday.
A joint statement published to the X Business account and the WFA website said that they are both “putting the litigation…behind them,” adding that “this resets the relationship between the two organizations.”
In August 2024, X levied an antitrust lawsuit against the nonprofit group and several of its member organizations, including Mars, CVS Health, and Unilever (eventually adding Shell, Lego, Nestlé, Tyson Foods, Colgate-Palmolive, and others). The case alleged that the advertisers illegally colluded in a politically motivated effort, through the WFA’s Global Alliance for Responsible Media (GARM), to boycott X and steer advertising investment away from right-leaning media platforms.
X claimed that the exodus of ad spend cost it billions in lost revenue. The platform’s 2024 ad revenue was $1.7 billion, down more than 62% from pre-Musk acquisition levels, per an S-1 filing made by X’s parent SpaceX in May.
The battle raised broader questions about advertisers’ ability to leverage investments across various media platforms, questions that the industry is still grappling with.
The WFA and the advertisers maintained that no illegal coordination occurred and that each brand independently decided where to advertise according to their own brand safety preferences.
Nonetheless, the dispute forced WFA to shutter GARM just days after X’s initial complaint was filed, citing the cost of defending itself. GARM was a voluntary cross-industry collaborative effort dedicated to mitigating digital safety risks.
The case was dismissed by a federal judge in March, determining that X was unable to demonstrate an antitrust violation. X appealed that decision in April.
Now, the two have reached an agreement.
In their joint statement, the organizations said they are “fully aligned in the view that brands, platforms and consumers will all benefit from brand-safety innovation.”
They added that “WFA reiterates its commitment to freedom of speech, a principle first included in WFA’s founding constitution back in 1953, and a principle it shares with X.”
The spat between X and WFA incited wider concerns about advertisers’ ability to influence media. Last summer, the U.S. Federal Trade Commission under Trump appointee Andrew Ferguson launched a probe into whether advertising groups, ad verification firms, and media-rating organizations illegally coordinated to shape advertising investment choices. The agency has issued Civil Investigative Demand (CID) letters, similar to subpoenas, to organizations including Media Matters for America, Ad Fontes Media, NewsGuard, Global Disinformation Index, and, as first reported by ADWEEK, Integral Ad Science.
