Glossary

The blame slide. Names a CEO, board chair, or auditor and details how their decisions destroyed value.

Catch-all for slides that don't fit any defined type — check the description field for specifics.

Management's own words from earnings calls or letters, juxtaposed with reality. Self-incrimination is the sharpest weapon.

Target benchmarked against 2–5 best-in-class peers on one metric. The canonical activist visual: "we lag X, and that gap = $Y of trapped value."

A title-card between argument beats (e.g. "The Problem", "Our Solution"). Gives the reader narrative pacing.

Snapshot of the target's key metrics today (revenue, margins, TSR, share price). Grounds the argument in current reality.

Supporting tables and back-up numbers at the end of the deck.

Legal disclaimers, conflict-of-interest statements, short-position disclosures.

Hinge slide that moves the argument forward — often just a provocative sentence on a clean background.

Enumerated asks — sell this segment, replace that director, return capital, etc. The "what we want" slide.

Decomposes the target into segments and prices each one separately (trading comps, DCF, etc.) to reveal hidden value.

List of comparable M&A deals with multiples. Used to argue the target is undervalued relative to what acquirers have paid.

Title page. The firm's branding, target company name, and date — sets the stage before any argument begins.

Proposed director's CV. Appears in proxy-fight decks where the firm is nominating a board slate.

Two- to four-bullet recap of the whole thesis. For skimmers — if they read only one slide, this is it.

The climactic "here's what it should be worth" slide — the punchline of the analysis.

Historical chronology of the target's decisions, incidents, or the activist's engagement with the company.

Operational flowchart — manufacturing process, value chain, corporate structure. Rare outside complex industrials.

One-slide distillation of the entire argument: the single sentence an investor would remember. The most quoted slide in the deck.

Technical notes on how the numbers were computed. Transparency signal.

Explicit contrast: current trajectory vs. our proposed trajectory. Often a side-by-side or a dashed-line forecast.

Road-map of the deck. Common in long decks (40+ pages) where the author wants to signal discipline and completeness up front.

Stand-alone legal page — rarer than appendix_disclosure.

Target vs. peers laid out in a table rather than a chart — used when the comparison spans multiple dimensions.

Decorative or repetitive — a pull-quote we've seen before, a firm-logo splash. Included for completeness but not load-bearing.

The opening beat of the Situation–Complication–Question–Answer structure. Sets the baseline state of affairs.

"They might say X, but here's why that's wrong." Activists address counter-arguments head-on rather than ignoring them.

The turning-point question the deck is committing to answer.

Mechanical detail of what the activist wants the board or market to do — not just "return capital" but "$5B buyback at $X".

Final call to action: vote yes, sell the segment, replace the chair. Usually the last content slide before appendix.

The thing that went wrong. The moment the argument says "but…"

Matrix of outcomes across cases. Similar to valuation_table but often for operating scenarios rather than share price.

Stand-alone contradiction exhibit — a claim + contrary evidence, side by side.

Multi-scenario table (bear / base / bull) showing per-share value under each case.

Strategic-consulting-style quadrant. Rare in financial decks but used for positioning arguments.

Early framing pages — mission, firm background, author credentials, or thesis preview. Bridges the cover into the argument.

Resolution of the SCQA arc — the activist's proposed fix.

Reference to a prior activist campaign or M&A outcome used as an analogue.

Generic appendix section (when the type isn't specifically data/methodology/disclosure).

Alternate label for sop_buildup (extraction artifact — same meaning).

The single most common rhetorical move. Management said X; reality shows Y. 24% of slides in the corpus do this.

Assign the problem to a specific person or group. The activist's signature: the target is someone, not a stock.

Identify and quantify what's broken. Not yet assigning blame — that's a different function.

Supporting material relegated to the back — legal, methodology, back-up tables.

Show target lagging peers / benchmark. The grammar: "below", "despite", "versus peers".

Narrative pacing — moves the reader from one beat to the next.

Give the reader the situational background — industry dynamics, company size, history.

Non-argumentative opening material — cover, author, agenda, ToC.

Set up the argument's emotional frame — this is where the rhetorical stance is chosen.

Put a number on the upside. "$X per share, 300% upside" — the activist has to be specific.

Reference prior campaigns or M&A deals. Social proof for the proposed remedy.

Explicit ask. Replace directors, sell segment, return capital, hire banker.

Side-by-side with 2–5 comparable companies. Often a chart, sometimes a table.

Break the target into parts, price each separately. The structural basis for sum-of-parts theses.

Present proposed directors — their bios, their credentials, why they're the fix.

The activist's prescription. Pure short-sellers have 0% propose_solution — they're not fixing, they're exposing.

Walk from current price to target price via specific catalysts — a waterfall of levers.

Address the counter-argument before the reader thinks of it. Rhetorical judo.

Low-signal content — retained for completeness but not carrying the argument.

Final imperative: vote, divest, replace. The last thing the deck says.

Rare variant of diagnose_problem (extraction artifact).

The slide's main claim — usually one sentence at the top. 71% of slides have one.

Block of prose — the "let me tell you" mode. 46% of slides have one.

Source attribution at the bottom of the slide. 46% of slides have one — sourcing is nearly universal.

Boxed emphasis — "If you read one thing on this slide, read this." 38% of slides have one.

Enumerated points — usually 3–5. 23% of slides.

Structured numeric table. 17% of slides — tables remain the pro's weapon when the story is "read these numbers yourself".

Pulled quote — usually from an earnings call or letter to shareholders. Foundation of the CEO-quote contradiction play.

Captured image of a filing, web page, email, or news article. Evidence from the original record.

Secondary line below the headline — context, caveat, or elaboration.

The workhorse. Compares discrete values — peer benchmarks, year-over-year, segment mix.

Table with explicit comparison columns (target, peer, delta).

Time series. Margins over 10 years, share price history, KPI trends.

Collection of company logos — peer set, board member companies, or firm's past campaigns.

On-the-ground photos — factory visits, retail locations. Heavy in Muddy Waters / Hindenburg-style short-seller work.

Visual element that doesn't fit the defined taxonomy — check the surrounding slide for context.

Flow diagram of an operational or financial process.

Ordered sequence — often used for demand lists or step-by-step recommendations.

Portrait photo of a CEO, director, or nominee. Used on villain slides and nominee bios.

Two or more series side-by-side per category (e.g. target vs. peer average across 5 metrics).

Parts of a whole per category — revenue by segment across years.

Scenario or method-based valuation in tabular form — multi-case DCF, sum-of-parts build.

Compact grid of key metrics with current value, trend, and peer comparison.

Grid of icons instead of logos — thematic pillars, services, or argument anchors.

Value-bridge visualization — the classic activist tool for sum-of-parts reveals. "Start at X, add segment A, add segment B, you get to Y."

Horizontal or vertical time-line graphic — events on an axis rather than a table.

Revenue mix, segment mix. Rare (<4% of charts) — pros prefer bars for the same data.

Single large numerical statistic dominating the slide. "$8B wasted."

Used when category labels are long (company names, KPI labels). Same role as vertical bar, better for long text.

Geographic visualization — stores, plants, regional revenue mix.

Pie-chart variant with hollow center — sometimes used for stage-of-thesis summaries.

Line with filled area — cumulative or share-of-total visualizations.

3-variable scatter (x, y, size). Rare; used for positioning target in an industry landscape.

Corporate-structure diagram — reporting lines, subsidiaries. Common in governance-critique decks.

Process-step diagram — decision trees, manufacturing steps, transaction structures.

Pipeline visualization — rare outside SaaS / commercial theses.

Multi-axis comparison. Extremely rare; seen in <5 slides across the corpus.

Dial-style visualization — almost never used in activist decks.