""Given the trends that we're exhibiting, the reversal in those trends, I'm just trying to understand what confidence that we can put in a reasonable timeframe, long term is a fairly vague definition, a reasonable time frame for evolution toward a 55% OR." — RBC; "One of the pushbacks we get in sort of recommending your stock is that there is a perception out there that maybe management is a little bit taking their time on the margin side. There isn't as much of a sense of urgency." — Bernstein; "Lance, I wonder if you could just give your investors a little bit of confidence... you guys have had some pretty significant OR targets out there for some time now." — Barclays; "Our analysis shows a significant efficiency gap between Union Pacific and its peers... This structural opportunity is execution-dependent but we sense the productivity improvement momentum currently occurring in the U.S. railroads, in part due to the management changes at CSX, provides significant incentive for management to attack this opportunity with more vigor." — BMO; "...we expect that management will begin to act with a sense of urgency to restore investor confidence (or will face increasing pressure to do so)." — Bernstein; "[on relative underperformance vs. peers] "...this is a tough question. But Lance, is there a sense of urgency that's been elevated?" — Deutsche Bank; "Ultimately, management needs to deliver better cost performance and under constant questioning they remained steadfast in their outlook to do so... we believe pressure will build on management to execute well." — Citi; "...I just want to understand what's embedded in the back-half guidance or the revised full year guidance? Because this is now the second time in, I don't know, 40-45 days that we're revising the full year outlook. ...there are a few people out there that have many decades of PSR experience that have been PSR implemented... Those guys seem to be available on a consultancy basis. I don't know if there is scope to bring in somebody on a short-term basis to accelerate some of the progress... Is that something that you're considering or looking at doing?" — Deutsche Bank; "I want to ask just a bigger picture question. I think some people are questioning the success or maybe the sustainability of PSR. ... We were supposed to do at 55% this year on our way to a lower low to mid-50s OR in a couple of years. Are those just the wrong numbers to be thinking about now for the OR over time?" — Wolfe; "And then for next year, I heard the word confident a lot. ...but not confident enough to give the OR guide for next year of 55%. ...is 55% achievable for next year?" — RBC; "...you laid out a multiyear productivity improvement for the network. ...are you confident that you can eventually obtain the aggregate plan over time? ...reset at a lower level going forward?" — Evercore ISI; "...can you talk a little bit to the longer-term transition plans? What skill sets do you think the Board really is focused on for the next leader of the business." — Susquehanna; "After a period pre-pandemic where significant improvement in operating efficiency resulted in the mgmt. team at the time boasting a forecast for an 'industry leading O/R,' mgmt. has now backed off that objective... Looking back to the period late 2016 to early 2019, that time was characterized by guidance that lacked conviction, a dearth of PSR expertise at the mgmt. level and (ultimately) sub-par operating results. Fundamentally, we are concerned that we are entering a new period characterized by the very same challenges." — RBC"
Callouts & quotes from 1,434+ activist slides
Every emphasised callout and every pulled quote, extracted slide-by-slide. Search by keyword, filter by slide type or by source.
""longer works because FD is now a detriment to the combined entity's valuation, 3) management seems unwilling to acknowledge the asset is destroying value, so 4) while the only hope is activism at this point - given management's ongoing hope that FD can rebound - the potential for activism seems low...." — Barclays – August 30, 2018; "Finally, we have also begun to field questions from investors about management's ability to successfully turnaround Family Dollar and whether DLTR would consider other strategic options...we are growing concerned that such a heavy focus of time, capital, and opex is being spent on Family Dollar with little to no fundamental improvement and that it may be better spent on the core Dollar Tree segment." — Goldman Sachs – August 30, 2018; "The market's interest in sum-of-the-parts (SOTP) and a potential break-up clearly indicates that the wheels have come off the Family Dollar bull thesis. This turnaround has stalled much too early and the core business, while producing good top-line, is experiencing margin pressure...Family Dollar a Clear Disappointment: Three years after closing on this turnaround project, comps are weak, the productivity gap to DG is as large as ever, and margins are back-tracking after initial progress. We estimate the value destruction of this deal at $7 billion...We were not fans of this transaction from the start, and it's now clear that DLTR would have been much better off today if they had not done this deal." — Wells Fargo – July 11, 2018; "While very low likelihood, in our view, DLTR could go down the path of multiple price points at Dollar Tree or simply raising the single price point. This could be done with or without the divestiture of Family Dollar stores. While, on paper, we understand the attractiveness of such a move (better comps and profit dollar growth, temporarily) we don't see the current Board or management team as amenable." — Credit Suisse – June 12, 2018; "Family Dollar's performance has disappointed investors – We have been disappointed/frustrated with Family Dollar's progression.... A 10% premium to the market for Dollar Tree implies investors are essentially getting Family Dollar for FREE...In this case, investors have essentially attributed ZERO value to Family Dollar's 8,000 stores, $10 billion of sales and $512mmE of EBIT." — RBC – June 8, 2018; "The Dollar Tree concept has been highly successful, but there remains significant opportunity to unlock value by expanding price points and we see three reasons this catalyst could arrive sooner than expected...Lastly, we believe the moment of truth is here for Family Dollar, and failure to drive a more meaningful comp improvement could leave management searching for another source of growth." — Wells Fargo – May 18, 2018"
""We believe the exit of CEO Kevin Johnson raises some concerns around execution, which has been largely uneven of late. That said, his eventual successor could be more opportunistic around costs and buybacks, while simplifying the product line. Time will tell" — Barclays (7/24/13); "Can we speak about the cost structure of Juniper and the scope for it to become more efficient? Because compared to many of the larger IT telecom equipment networking stocks, the operating expense to sales ratio ... [is] almost one of the highest of all the companies that we've looked at. ... Is it a case of direct cost-cutting?" — Credit Suisse, CS Tech Conference (12/4/13); "One of the frustrations I hear from investors is around OpEx and OpEx management. I think you have one of the highest percentages in terms of sales of R&D spend. We've seen other companies in the sector that have throttled back on OpEx, returning cash in an aggressive way, and they're being rewarded for that" — UBS, UBS Tech Conference (11/19/13); "Cost cutting should be focal. Juniper's operating margin structure has been under pressure for several years ... Over the same period revenue has grown at a CAGR of 3.3% per year which raises questions about management's ability to control operating expenses. On an absolute dollar basis, operating expenses have risen by over $300 million from $1.8 billion in 2010 to $2.1 billion in 2012 which, as a percentage of sales, is the highest within our coverage universe" — Credit Suisse (9/18/13); "The retirement of CEO Kevin Johnson, while not expected this quarter, could provide an opportunity for a new strategic approach given the difficulties the company has faced. At the very least, it gives the stock a chance to benefit from the restructuring and realignment story that usually occurs after a CEO transition" — Morgan Stanley (7/24/13); "We view the increased opex as disappointing as leverage was one of the main reasons investors were attracted to Juniper's stock" — Stifel Nicolaus (7/24/13); "We continue to believe the company's R&D level is far too high and generates below average returns compared to rivals such as Cisco and F5 which have R&D in the 10-11% of revenue range" — Wedbush Securities (6/13/12); "The main issue that is impacting Juniper's opex structure is the number of new projects the company has undertaken ..., each of which required big new investments. ... In our view, the underwhelming initial reception for MobileNext and QFabric is evidence that the company should adopt a more prudent investment strategy going forward .... We also believe that Juniper should address its cost structure ... including exiting lagging businesses" — Bank of America Merrill Lynch (5/23/12)"
"Okay, great. And finally, your gross margins went up sequentially, which is interesting given that your payments revenue is ramping. Can you comment that dynamic? Is that reflective of the strength within the software business [when you had some higher] ARPU in the quarter? Or are you also seeing some improvement in your payment margins based on your growing scale? — BMO Analyst, Nov 2020. Yes, a little bit of all of the above. I mean, we obviously, given the growth in customers, saw some nice increase in the subscription line churn starting to come back towards normal, again, which helped a lot. Some of the discounting measures that we had in place are going [all start there a little off balance], as you know. We do continue to kind of look for ways to drive incremental margin and payments. And I guess, the other aspect to the overall gross margin is -- as you know, we do have some legacy payment referral revenue streams. And as those volumes are covered in the quarter as well, it would have been incremental to margin? — CEO Dasilva, Nov 2020. You have the very helpful slide that shows the adoption and some of the geos and verticals. Certainly seems to be going in the right direction. I'm just kind of curious once we think about what this is going to look like maybe after we've incorporated ShopKeep and Upserve, which I believe have higher ARPUs in part because they've been successful at payments, if we should be expecting it to kick up? Or just curious on how the incorporation of those companies will impact these dynamics? — Keybanc Analyst, Feb 2021. Yes, for sure, will tick up the Upserve business in particular. The vast majority of their customers were using Upserve payments as kind of they have a really nice elegant solution that embeds Payments right into the product itself. ShopKeep, they were further along as well on the Payments journey from a customer adoption perspective, though as we've talked about, largely through a referral model, but a good percentage of their customers do use a payment solution there. And as we talked about earlier, the teams are working hard to move those or to build the infrastructure to make sure that Lightspeed Payments is available to those customers. So all told, we expect those things to really positively impact our overall penetration at a global level. And of course, that's core to what we're trying to do around here is to make sure that the vast majority of our customers worldwide take Payments. So all these things, I think, are helpful. — CFO Nussey, Feb 2021"
""Our analysis of a theoretical model in which 80% of BWLD is franchised along conservative industry standards yields per share valuations significantly higher than BWLD's current share price" — Nick Setyan, Wedbush, 2/8/17; "[D]irectionally the activist plan is a much better plan than the one the current management team is focused on" — Howard Penney, Hedgeye, 8/18/16; "[T]he math [on a transition to a 90% franchised business model] looks intriguing, even when using what we think are conservative assumptions" — David Tarantino, Baird, 10/24/16; "[D]uring its Analyst Day...[Management] failed to address any changes to BWLD's long-term company/franchise store mix (now at 52% company-owned, which we believe should be reduced) by defending ongoing consideration of future franchise purchases (where we would hope for a re-franchising strategy)" — Paul Westra, Stifel, 8/16/16; "We like the potential for additional value-unlocking actions or a more drastic tack in strategy in-line with some of the ideas outlined in a recent 13D filing...Investors may look past downward revisions if the prospect of transformative action is on the table, but if this is called into doubt, fundamentals suggest a lower price for the stock" — John Zolidis, Buckingham, 9/15/16; "[A] falling [ROIC] as a result of higher capex could suggest a greater proportion of units would create more per share value as franchised units (e.g., where the same capex could be deployed for share repurchases)...Investors remain highly focused on the potential opportunity for BWLD to increase its franchise mix" — Karen Holthouse, Goldman Sachs, 8/4/16; "We view refranchising as a realistic alternative path to value creation for shareholders...Investors often forget BWLD was >65% franchised a few years ago. Our conversations with brokers that specialize in restaurant and franchisee transactions lead us to believe the appetite for most of BWLD's markets would be strong, and could command multiples towards the higher end of the 5-6x unit-level EBITDA industry standard"' — Nick Setyan, Wedbush, 9/12/16; "We believe investors would applaud the introduction of multi-year refranchising programs from Buffalo Wild Wings" — Jeff Farmer, Wells Fargo, 7/13/16; "'Logic' supports the premise that a franchise model is better insulated against economic volatility, generating a high margin annuity stream of royalties with limited operating volatility...We expect investors to further encourage (re)franchising / licensing at [BWLD]" — Jeffrey Bernstein, Barclays, 5/17/16"
"“We think the frequency of HES's analyst meetings could be increased. How about biannual?” — Merrill Lynch (May 22, 2006). “The key question, in our view, going forward is whether Hess is starting to spread itself too thin via a growing project portfolio list.” — Goldman Sachs (April 26, 2006). “The aggressive upstream exploration story driven by John O'Connor is under pressure, as a run of dry holes is looming larger. With no completion target, the story has an uncertain future, costs are rising and prospects are pushed from this year to next.” — Deutsche Bank (April 26, 2006). “This company has not historically shown good capital discipline, delivering one of the highest F&D costs in the sector and one of the lower returns on capital.” — Bank of America (January 27, 2005). “Despite a new record quarterly oil price environment and sequentially much higher production levels, worldwide unit profitability rose only marginally ... because of continued heavy hedging loss (no surprise here) and a sharp increase of costs.” — Lehman Brothers (January 27, 2005). “Hess's long-term share performance has been hampered by an inability to show sustainable volume growth and value creation in the upstream...As a result, Hess's 10-year share price performance has been the weakest among the integrated oils.” — Merrill Lynch (October 21, 2004). “Following several years of missed targets, [Hess] has refrained from offering production guidance much beyond the current year. Whilst this plays to its benefit by avoiding the risk of over promising / under delivery, it also clouds the outlook over the coming years. HES's reluctance to commit to any long-term production objectives is understandable in the context of a poor track record where a succession of aggressive growth targets has been missed.” — Citigroup Smith Barney (October 11, 2004). “Hess needs to spend aggressively to arrest its imploding production profile. The risk is whether these capital investments will generate competitive returns, a concern to investors given the recent history of production and reserve disappointments...” — Merrill Lynch (April 29, 2004). “The question, in our view, is whether Hess is truly creating a culture that is focused on profitability first.” — Goldman Sachs (February 6, 2004)."
"4/7/08: “Michael the good news is we have a team here that’s really working together.”; 7/8/09: “So the good news was we believe that there was room for improvement and here we go.”; 1/10/11: “Good news is, and you’ll see some of this here on the right-hand side, Alcoa continues to be recognized for what I would call values-based management.”; 10/6/08: “The good news is if you talk about real future projects, we can continue to look at future projects because as I said before our mid- to long-term prospect in alumina and aluminum is positive.”; 7/12/10: “I mean the good news is Russia is coming back.”; 4/11/11: “And the good news, also on top of it, 32% revenue growth on a year-over-year basis.”; 10/11/11: “We are, and that’s the good news here, whatever lies ahead of us, we are prepared to take it.”; 4/10/12: “And the good news also is all of that would not be possible if we wouldn’t have driven process innovations.”; 1/8/13: “In Europe, we expect a decline of 4% to 6% in 2013, and that is also relatively good news because the decline is slowing.”; 4/8/13: “But that’s better news -- I mean, more good news than bad news, I would say.”; 10/8/13: “So good news to come and I think the orders are showing in the right direction here.”; 1/12/09: “The good news is all of those markets are our end markets in Russia.”; 10/7/10: “So with that, let’s go to the aluminum demand and see what implications the end markets drive has on the aluminum demand, and this is actually pretty good news.”; 7/11/11: “And the good news is, we’ve constantly innovated and substituted our own solutions.”; 11/9/11: “So there’s a lot of moving elements in this segment of our business, we need the productivity but we also get it, and that’s the good news.”; 1/9/12: “Well, I think the good news is we’re doing it in addition to the things that we’ve done before.”; 11/7/12: “The good news is the growth rate is exactly in those fields that are higher-margin on traditionally and will be, that’s fantastic.”; 7/8/13: “This is the good news. I mean, the good news is that we will be able to grow our aerospace business, I mean, and every one of the segments that caters to aerospace.”"
""Think, first off, on ERP, we are executing our program. We're now live with sort of 3 of our entities on our global SAP platform, corporate, CMF and Instruments. We have an active rollout plan for all of our divisions. And honestly, it's 2 to 3 a year, so that will roll out over the next couple of years here before we really start to feel that the platform is spread enough across the company that will drive significant efficiencies." — CFO Boehnlein, Q3 2019 Earnings Call. "Yes. So certainly, we've delivered the 30 to 50, but the underlying performance has been better than that, as you know, because we -- our acquisitions have had dilution. So underlying op margin has been expanding more sort of the 70, 80 bps range. And we really are just started on our -- on the big heavy lifting margin expansion. The way we've been getting it is through indirect procurement. It's been through I'd call it sort of hustle and sort of old-fashioned cost reduction. The bigger rocks, we haven't moved those yet and that has to do with the plant network. That has to do with the ERP. We've gone live with 3 of our divisions right now, but we still have a lot more to do, and frankly, globally to move to one SAP system. We had a huge implementation that occurred in July this year, which went very well. So we're really excited that we do have the right platform of ERP. We've been through some big integrations. Now it's just a question of rolling them out. That will take us 2 to 3 years to move to one ERP system." — CEO Lobo, MS Conf, Sept 10, 2019. "Impairment charges in the six months 2021 were not significant. In the second quarter of 2020, due to the significant negative impact the COVID-19 pandemic had on our operations and financial results, we suspended certain in-process investments resulting in charges of $189 to impair certain long-lived assets (primarily the portion of our investment in a new global ERP system that was in-process of being developed for future deployment) and product line and other exit costs. These charges were included in cost of sales and selling, general and administrative expenses." — Q2 2020 10-Q."
""We, therefore, encourage you to support the changes sought by our fellow shareholders at Elliott Management. We intend to support Elliott's proposed proxy slate because it serves the long-term interests of the Company and its owners." — First Pacific Advisors, February 6, 2017; "Independent members of this board, who own less than 0.1% of outstanding shares, continue to disregard the overwhelming publicly expressed desire for leadership change from the company's largest long-term owners, including Orbis." — Adam Karr, Orbis Investment Management, March 3, 2017; "Lion Point believes that Elliott's plan for value creation can reverse the past and set new Arconic on a better path to creating shareholder value." — Lion Point Capital, February 16, 2017; "It's a CEO problem—there has been no value created." — Sarat Sethi, Douglas Lane & Associates, February 30, 2017; "We also acknowledge activism could create an opportunity to highlight value that is even higher at $40 (and in the range of the activist target) to account for significant margin expansion from current levels, premised on a market P/E of 17x and earnings of $2.37." — Morgan Stanley, February 1, 2017; "In our view, a new CEO is an important positive catalyst to more expeditiously improve the company's operations and increase its margins while rationalizing capital expenditures / M&A opportunities." — Wolfe Research, February 6, 2017; "Elliott has a good case. Investor returns under Chief Executive Klaus Kleinfeld, who took over at Alcoa in 2008 and now runs Arconic, have been poor. Investors have seen their stock lose well over half its value under Kleinfeld." — Reuters, February 1, 2017; "Saving Klaus from Paul Singer is top priority for its management. Drain the swamp. Let Elliott Management's recommendations prevail. Too many good people are getting hurt throughout this Company." — Glass Door, March 17, 2017; "If I were an Arconic shareholder, I would be voting the "blue card" to bring the dissidents to power." — Pittsburgh Tribune, March 13, 2017"
""On the topic of innovation, on dairy cmon, there's not a lot of innovation. On the cheese side there's a little more. But, the big push and where they made a big investment is in the plant-based foods and cheeses. They had some lofty goals for the business to achieve. We had a hard time wrapping our heads around how these goals would be met. Quite frankly, who likes the product? They have a substantial plan for retail and are pushing hard, but I think the sales team is struggling." — Former Saputo Executive; "Nobody knows the Saputo name unless you're in the business. To me that hurts them on the retail side. They were trying to do brand consolidation. They have tons of brands you've never heard. They had private label brands for stores, and some didn't make sense for the volumes. The joke at Saputo was we're going to fill you 100%, 50% of the time. I don't know if the production issues have gotten better. Labor has been an issue." — Former Saputo Executive; "Yes, it will be disruptive to Saputo. They're closer to Saputo's New Mexico footprint. Leprino makes good cheese. I do think it's going to be a problem for Saputo, especially in the Texas area." — Former Saputo Executive; "In terms of the strategic priorities and stimulating organic revenue growth, they have no advantage over anyone. Their biggest brand is Saputo Gold mozzarella, it's their best product. I just don't see it. It's not going to happen in the plant-based business. I can't think of any product differentiator for Saputo on the cheese side. The hardest thing for Saputo is to grow the business. Again, they are logistically challenged. Just to get volume on some of the mozzarella, there was almost no margin. The plants have to keep running." — Former Saputo Executive"
"And then can you talk a little bit more about the profitability in your clean energy business and with PWRcell? I mean you mentioned that you were profitable. I think that was an EBITDA comment, but I want to clarify that. And can you talk at all about the gross margins for your clean energy business? Where roughly will they be by the end of 2021 in comparison to your overall gross margin? And just how should we think of it more on like a 2 to 3-year basis as you continue to ramp? — Roth Analyst. Yes. Ross, it's York. So yes, making very good progress on gross margin optimization, a lot of focus on the bill of material, a lot of focus on supply chain. And you're right. Leaving the year here in 2020, in Q4, we were profitable. That was a nice landmark or a milestone for the start-up business being profitable in Q4. But throughout 2021, yes, we do expect to ramp up our gross margins to somewhere in the mid-30% range. So that's relative what we do, almost 40%, I guess, high 30s here, gross margin for 2020. So close to the company average by the end of 2020 is the plan. And then obviously, we're going to be ramping up our operating expenses to really go fast after this market. So expecting EBITDA margins to grow throughout the year as well, along with gross margins, maybe hitting double digits there by the end of the year for EBITDA margins. — CFO York, Q4 2020. Today, clean energy, just thinking storage, that is a profitable business today. We haven't quoted exactly what margin profile is. It's profitable today. But over time, over the next call it, few years, that will also grow into that mid- to high teens EBITDA margins as well. So we've got a road map and a path to get there. — CFO York, Q3 2021"
""Investors in PFE have been battered twice in the last 2 weeks - the first came with danuglipron's failure (oral GLP1),the second with the new guidance. No doubt there was an element of capitulation... In other words, despite a year of major underperformance, it's hard to say PFE's a "buy." Some credibility has been lost, and the near-term catalyst path is not a strong one." — Wolfe, December 14, 2023; "Given the high number of questions we have received on EPS and margin dynamics and the implications for 2025 results, we do not see today's update as a clearing event. Today's update essentially should provide a floor on COVID estimates and EPS, in our view. However, there remains a significant amount of uncertainty on what is driving 2024 margins & EPS so low (i.e. whether this is due to depressed COVID guidance or there is an issue with the core business margins, or a mix of both). And based on our conversations, we expect that investors will have a hard time stepping into the story until they gain further clarity." — JP Morgan, December 13, 2023; "But we don't have much conviction in the outlook, making it tough to pound the table even from these levels... Level Of Confidence In Management - Our confidence is not the highest for several reasons. PFE provided guidance on many parameters but in retrospect much of it is proving to have been too optimistic, is no longer supported, and resulted in two reductions in guidance in 2023. We were not fans of the Seagen acquisition from the start, given that each of the key assets has associated questions, making the outlook less than clear, particularly given the price paid." — TD Cowen, January 4, 2024"
""Investors in PFE have been battered twice in the last 2 weeks - the first came with danuglipron's failure (oral GLP1),the second with the new guidance. No doubt there was an element of capitulation... In other words, despite a year of major underperformance, it's hard to say PFE's a "buy." Some credibility has been lost, and the near-term catalyst path is not a strong one." — Wolfe, December 14, 2023; "Given the high number of questions we have received on EPS and margin dynamics and the implications for 2025 results, we do not see today's update as a clearing event. Today's update essentially should provide a floor on COVID estimates and EPS, in our view. However, there remains a significant amount of uncertainty on what is driving 2024 margins & EPS so low (i.e. whether this is due to depressed COVID guidance or there is an issue with the core business margins, or a mix of both). And based on our conversations, we expect that investors will have a hard time stepping into the story until they gain further clarity." — JP Morgan, December 13, 2023; "But we don't have much conviction in the outlook, making it tough to pound the table even from these levels... Level Of Confidence In Management - Our confidence is not the highest for several reasons. PFE provided guidance on many parameters but in retrospect much of it is proving to have been too optimistic, is no longer supported, and resulted in two reductions in guidance in 2023. We were not fans of the Seagen acquisition from the start, given that each of the key assets has associated questions, making the outlook less than clear, particularly given the price paid." — TD Cowen, January 4, 2024"
"Quite frankly, I think [regaining the high ground] is going to require evolution. We’ve been concerned about Southwest for some time, that it has mostly, not entirely, but mostly sat out the industry’s evolution... They have a product and price points that skew more toward discount airlines but a cost structure overall that skews a bit more toward the Big 3. It’s a bit of an identity crisis. — J.P. Morgan Webcast, May 2023; Everything [they're] doing is incremental. [They] need to make radical changes. — Wolfe Research Weekly Webcast, October 2023; ...What might you consider strategically or put on the table that hasn't been on the table before? So if we think about things like seat assignments, basic economy, bags fly free, historically, those have been sacrosanct... If you have lagging margins, it may require a harder look. — Evercore Analyst on Q3 2023 Earnings Call, October 2023; There is a lot of debate about the airline's lack of a premium product vs. peers and ancillary revenue opportunities beyond boarding... The drum beat on closing the margin gap with the network airlines will continue to beat louder... — Cowen, January 2024; Time to pull the RASM lever?... The main – and perhaps only – lever they have now to overcome cost inflation is to boost RASM... LUV still remains at a relative disadvantage to all their major competitors in the pursuit of premiumization. — Morgan Stanley, January 2024; We have long made the case that the Company's inability to monetize its cabin and participate in various high-margin revenue streams was a drag on relative margin performance. — Deutsche Bank, April 2024"
"Quite frankly, I think [regaining the high ground] is going to require evolution. We’ve been concerned about Southwest for some time, that it has mostly, not entirely, but mostly sat out the industry’s evolution... They have a product and price points that skew more toward discount airlines but a cost structure overall that skews a bit more toward the Big 3. It’s a bit of an identity crisis. — J.P. Morgan Webcast, May 2023; Everything [they’re] doing is incremental. [They] need to make radical changes. — Wolfe Research Weekly Webcast, October 2023; ...What might you consider strategically or put on the table that hasn’t been on the table before? So if we think about things like seat assignments, basic economy, bags fly free, historically, those have been sacrosanct... If you have lagging margins, it may require a harder look. — Evercore Analyst on Q3 2023 Earnings Call, October 2023; There is a lot of debate about the airline’s lack of a premium product vs. peers and ancillary revenue opportunities beyond boarding... The drum beat on closing the margin gap with the network airlines will continue to beat louder... — Cowen, January 2024; Time to pull the RASM lever?... The main – and perhaps only – lever they have now to overcome cost inflation is to boost RASM... LUV still remains at a relative disadvantage to all their major competitors in the pursuit of premiumization. — Morgan Stanley, January 2024; We have long made the case that the Company’s inability to monetize its cabin and participate in various high-margin revenue streams was a drag on relative margin performance. — Deutsche Bank, April 2024"
"Quite frankly, I think [regaining the high ground] is going to require evolution. We’ve been concerned about Southwest for some time, that it has mostly, not entirely, but mostly sat out the industry’s evolution... They have a product and price points that skew more toward discount airlines but a cost structure overall that skews a bit more toward the Big 3. It’s a bit of an identity crisis. — J.P. Morgan Webcast, May 2023; Everything [they’re] doing is incremental. [They] need to make radical changes. — Wolfe Research Weekly Webcast, October 2023; ...What might you consider strategically or put on the table that hasn't been on the table before? So if we think about things like seat assignments, basic economy, bags fly free, historically, those have been sacrosanct... If you have lagging margins, it may require a harder look. — Evercore Analyst on Q3 2023 Earnings Call, October 2023; There is a lot of debate about the airline’s lack of a premium product vs. peers and ancillary revenue opportunities beyond boarding... The drum beat on closing the margin gap with the network airlines will continue to beat louder... — Cowen, January 2024; Time to pull the RASM lever?... The main – and perhaps only – lever they have now to overcome cost inflation is to boost RASM... LUV still remains at a relative disadvantage to all their major competitors in the pursuit of premiumization. — Morgan Stanley, January 2024; We have long made the case that the Company’s inability to monetize its cabin and participate in various high-margin revenue streams was a drag on relative margin performance. — Deutsche Bank, April 2024"
"Quite frankly, I think [regaining the high ground] is going to require evolution. We’ve been concerned about Southwest for some time, that it has mostly, not entirely, but mostly sat out the industry’s evolution... They have a product and price points that skew more toward discount airlines but a cost structure overall that skews a bit more toward the Big 3. It’s a bit of an identity crisis. — J.P. Morgan Webcast, May 2023; Everything [they’re] doing is incremental. [They] need to make radical changes. — Wolfe Research Weekly Webcast, October 2023; ...What might you consider strategically or put on the table that hasn't been on the table before? So if we think about things like seat assignments, basic economy, bags fly free, historically, those have been sacrosanct... If you have lagging margins, it may require a harder look. — Evercore Analyst on Q3 2023 Earnings Call, October 2023; There is a lot of debate about the airline's lack of a premium product vs. peers and ancillary revenue opportunities beyond boarding... The drum beat on closing the margin gap with the network airlines will continue to beat louder... — Cowen, January 2024; Time to pull the RASM lever?... The main – and perhaps only – lever they have now to overcome cost inflation is to boost RASM... LUV still remains at a relative disadvantage to all their major competitors in the pursuit of premiumization. — Morgan Stanley, January 2024; We have long made the case that the Company's inability to monetize its cabin and participate in various high-margin revenue streams was a drag on relative margin performance. — Deutsche Bank, April 2024"
""We believe the status quo at NSC will lead to continued underperformance of the railroad. We also believe that Board refreshment and Jim Barber's and Jamie Boychuk's leadership are essential for enhancing safety and for ensuring outstanding long-term achievements for the benefit of all NSC's shareholders and other stakeholders." — EdgePoint Investment Group; "[W]e believe a change in management and refreshment of the board at NSC are warranted and could stimulate improved operations and thus equity performance. For these reasons, we intend to support the election of dissident nominees Betsy Atkins, James Barber, Jr., William Clyburn, Jr., Sameh Fahmy, John Kasich, Gilbert Lamphere, and Allison Landry." — Neuberger Berman; "Important from yesterday's town hall was commentary that PSR implementation is going to be slower than what we saw at CSX given in our view changes to the regulatory environment and the proposed management team's focus on the customer [...] Overall, we view this plan as contrasting heavily against Norfolk's Resilience Model and expect headcount reduction can be achieved on the back of attrition, in addition to head office cuts." — RBC Capital Markets note issued on April 19th; "NSC's activist campaign appears to have unanimous support from institutional investors." — Deutsche Bank Research note issued on April 15th; "We see value in potential management change with Jim Barber as CEO and Jamie Boychuk as COO as proposed by the activist investor Ancora, especially given the historical margin underperformance of Norfolk Southern." — Barclays Equity Research note issued on March 25th"
"“...[Huntsman] trades at a relatively discounted valuation vs. peers as shares have lagged the group YTD. While we see these characteristics as favorable, in the context of HUN’s margins and FCF generation that we view as low relative to peers, we see this underperformance as fair...” — Wolfe Research, June 2021; “Huntsman is unlikely to trade at hybrid/diversified chemical multiples. We attribute this primarily to differences in margins and thus the market's perception of the degree of specialization of the company's products. From a segment or portfolio mix perspective it is not self evident that Huntsman meaningfully differs from diversified chemical peers Celanese or Eastman...Not withstanding our view that Huntsman has meaningfully improved its earnings stability and margin structure over the last few years, the company's margin remains well below that of hybrid/diversified peers such as Celanese and Eastman...” — Morgan Stanley, September 2020; “We feel part of the issue is that HUN’s cost structure has not changed as dynamically as its revenue...the elevated cost structure is dampening margins and impeding free cash flow conversion.” — BofA Securities, June 2020; “On cash conversion, we remain skeptical. Free cash flow conversion from Adj. EBITDA for Huntsman has historically lagged, as sizeable restructuring efforts and capital investments have hindered cash flow...We believe the market needs to see a longer track record of solid cash generation before fully underwriting a structural change in the company's cash flow profile...” — Barclays, October 2018"
""The biggest risk is pricing pressure. I would say big pricing pressure from the retailers. Also, supply chain distribution is another risk. I would say price pressure will eat up their margin because they are over exposed to big box retailers." — Former PBH Employee; "As far as the big box stores, the pricing for the past 10 years has been very flat. There has been some growth in certain segments, such as C stores where they have seen some growth on the pricing side. But for the big box stores, the price changes were very flat because of reason like allowances, they would give a lot of concessions." — Former PBH Employee; "I am worried about the supply chain disruption because sometimes they can absorb the price increase from the suppliers. but sometimes retailers cannot pass on the consumer. I would think that for the big box retailers, they'll have a lot of price pressure. They will have to come up with some creative strategy to pass it on to other channel that are not as price elastic." — Former PBH Employee; "I don't think they will have a lot of price increase they can pass on to the big box retailers because they will come up with private brands. They will grow and put intense pressure. The only way is to go after the smaller players." — Former PBH Employee; "The challenge comes when its more than 50% savings. When a product comes in a 50% savings, that's when you lose much more." — Senior Manager Large PBH Customer"
""The biggest risk is pricing pressure. I would say big pricing pressure from the retailers. Also, supply chain distribution is another risk. I would say price pressure will eat up their margin because they are over exposed to big box retailers." — Former PBH Employee; "As far as the big box stores, the pricing for the past 10 years has been very flat. There has been some growth in certain segments, such as C stores where they have seen some growth on the pricing side. But for the big box stores, the price changes were very flat because of reason like allowances, they would give a lot of concessions." — Former PBH Employee; "I am worried about the supply chain disruption because sometimes they can absorb the price increase from the suppliers. but sometimes retailers cannot pass on the consumer. I would think that for the big box retailers, they'll have a lot of price pressure. They will have to come up with some creative strategy to pass it on to other channel that are not as price elastic. I don't think they will have a lot of price increase they can pass on to the big box retailers because they will come up with private brands. They will grow and put intense pressure. The only way is to go after the smaller players." — Former PBH Employee; "The challenge comes when its more than 50% savings. When a product comes in a 50% savings, that's when you lose much more." — Senior Manager Large PBH Customer"
""The story of the quarter is one of service revenue miss as it was essentially flat on a year-over-year basis. Our core offerings were affected primarily by channel disruption associated with cloud adoption. We did see some spending pull back late in the quarter and then we saw some underperformance in the U.K. So we're trying to be very transparent here to tell you why the miss." — CEO Shirley Singleton; "Total gross margin in the third quarter of 2016 was 35% compared to 38% in the year ago quarter, while gross margin related to service revenue in the third quarter of 2016 was 37% compared to 40% in the third quarter of 2015. The year-over-year change in both total gross margin and service gross margin during the third quarter of 2016 were primarily attributable to the current year increase in project and personnel cost and a decline in the software revenue margin contribution due to the change in the comparative quarterly software revenue mix." — CFO Tim Oakes; "Net income for the third quarter of 2016 was $43,000 or $0.00 per diluted share compared to net income of $1 million or $0.08 per diluted share during the third quarter of 2015. The change in periodic net income is in large part attributable to the previously discussed flat year-over-year third quarter 2016 service revenue combined with the increases in projects and personnel costs." — CFO Tim Oakes"
""High marks for management. CEO Mark Donegan has a manufacturing background and graduated from the GE manufacturing management program in 1979, two years prior to Jack Welch becoming CEO. His chief success prior to taking the reins at [PCC] was at the helm of Wyman-Gordon, a [PCC] subsidiary where he led the business to historically high operating margins and growth. We think the most notable aspect of Mark Donegan’s career was his ability to manage a manufacturing concern profitably through the aerospace decline in the 1990’s." — Goldman Sachs, October 10, 2007; "From there, we want to take that baseline cost structure and we want to go back into the market where we want to drive for market share. We'll also take and add to that the ability we have on vertical integration... So market share is key and then we take that and drive that back across the assets that we created more capacity... We're not looking for just sales growth. We're looking for key assets that give us an expanding portfolio, attack our costs, long-term market share gain and growth." — Mark Donegan, December 3, 2014; "[PCC] generally leverages superb execution for market share gains through pricing strategies and long-term contracts. We believe [PCC] is one of the best operators in our space, as operating margins are generally above peer companies." — Bank of America, June 4, 2014"
"Freight affects the gross margin. Normally, Oatly pays the freight. If the freight is paid by the customer, no problem. We tried, in the beginning when we were small, we had no power to have customers pay the freight. Also, there was a big problem in the system, but I was able raise the topic with the team to fix it. We had negative gross margin. I said, what is going on here, how can we produce losing money? In the system, there were issues with tracking items. We had so many warehouses, there was no control or coordination....We tried to fix it, and that brought big changes in the freight and improvement in gross margin. Originally, we used standard cost (inventory accounting) and the standard cost wasn't established properly. Raw materials, labor and clearly the big factor and issue was overhead. It was just a percentage, but it was totally out of proportion. So we went to a different system. We tried to go to ABC (activity-based costing) but the plant was too new and we didn't have enough expert people, and we couldn't do it. I think the Company is very aware that this is an issue, especially now in a public environment. The cost needs to be released (chuckle), that information has to be accurate. I think now with the people and the team Blackstone is building, that's something they know how to work with. — Former Oatly Accounting Professional"
"[...] we believe a change in management and refreshment of the board at NSC are warranted and could stimulate improved operations and thus equity performance. For these reasons, we intend to support the election of dissident nominees Betsy Atkins, James Barber, Jr., William Clyburn, Jr., Sameh Fahmy, John Kasich, Gilbert Lamphere, and Allison Landry. — Neuberger Berman; We see value in potential management change with Jim Barber as CEO and Jamie Boychuk as COO as proposed by the activist investor Ancora... especially given the historical margin underperformance of Norfolk Southern. — Barclays; We believe the status quo at NSC will lead to continued underperformance of the railroad. We also believe that Board refreshment and Jim Barber's and Jamie Boychuk's leadership are essential for enhancing safety and for ensuring outstanding long-term achievements for the benefit of all NSC's shareholders and other stakeholders. — EdgePoint Investment Group; It appears NSC is making the case that changing the Board and management would pose significant risk to service and safety. But in reality, NSC has already endured the most service and safety challenges in recent years, including the unfortunate events of East Palestine last year, and defective chassis across its network that impacted service and posed safety risks in 2021. — Deutsche Bank"
""As a reminder, we've been working on a number of finance alternatives to eliminate the need for new restricted cash or PPA deals where Plug Power finances the assets directly. In some, or likely all, of the new financing scenarios the cat profile of the transaction will be much better. The accounting rules dictate we cannot recognize revenues up front as we've done with traditional sale-leaseback arrangements. The presentation of adjusted numbers is intended to show our performance as if we finance a transaction as we have in the past. Again, we believe it provides a clearer picture of the sales and implementation progress of the Company and a consistent comparison to past performance." — Andrew Marsh - CEO, Plug Power; "Before I get started, I want to highlight that beginning this quarter, Plug Power's quarterly financial results will no longer include the non-GAAP measures of adjusted revenue, adjusted gross margin, adjusted EBITDAS, or adjusted EPS to reflect the impact of deployed Power Purchase Agreement transactions under alternative financing arrangements. However, we will continue to provide supplemental information to all external stakeholders as we believe it's important we convey the company's overall progress in growth and cost-downs and to maintain complete transparency." — Andrew Marsh - CEO, Plug Power"
""While Box was once one of the fastest-growing companies in software (70% growth at $225M+ in ARR at IPO), growth has dramatically decelerated, even prior to COVID. Growth did improve in the most recent quarter (with some COVID headwinds fading), but we do not believe Box will be able to sustain double-digit growth and find its FY24 12%-16% revenue growth target difficult to underwrite... Part of the reason we struggle to underwrite Box's story of accelerating growth and expanding margins is the fact that Box has discussed initiatives to accelerate growth in the past, but not delivered on it, and has had several different target models, consistently needing to walk them back... Based on our due diligence, we do believe that Box has competitively differentiated technology for content management at the enterprise end of the market and like the company's vision but take the view that a mixture of competitive pressures (namely OneDrive) and an underperforming GTM motion are the primary contributors to the company's underwhelming execution. Additionally, considering the nature of Box's solutions, if the rise of remote work and digital transformation trends haven't yet translated into an improved environment for the company we are not sure what Box needs to see to start executing." — RBC Capital Markets, July 2021"
"“There’s a structural problem that the people who are leading the company [the Business Unit President’s] are designed to lead service and implementation as the primary focus with a matrix for other [functions]. The other leading SaaS companies, service and implementation are utilities. They can matrix in. It’s the exact opposite at ADP… If you only control service and support, you’ll try and improve margin with that. Show 100-200-300 bps and do it on the backs of people, throw some efficiency service tools. They are incapable of fundamentally transforming the customer experience from a service business to a SaaS experience, they don’t control the tools.” — Former DVP, Business Transformation; “Only three people [beyond Carlos] really looked across the entire business: head of IT, head of sales and the CFO. If doing your thing was bad for the overall business, but good for your business, that’s what you’d do because that’s what the incentives drove… I would integrate the service and implementations teams. [There is] an opportunity to restructure, get product complexity down. Look at the segmentation, figure out if this is right. Each BU has its own CFO, Finance, HR, etc. [It] creates a lot of internal waste. [ADP] should un-segment this business… There is so much replication.” — Former Senior Executive"
"So all those things, we feel, will function to get us in that intermediate term back to those double-digit margins. — Richard Kramer, CEO of Goodyear, Nov 14 2017; When we are able to recover the margin we've lost from a price versus raw material perspective, that is going to mean a return to something like we saw during that 2014 to 2016 period. And we're confident that we can get back to those levels and work to go beyond. — Darren Wells, Former Goodyear EVP / CFO, Jan 16 2019; I think the question for us and the drive is to think about what it takes to get ourselves back to double-digit margins. And we see a lot of opportunity, as we combine Goodyear and Cooper to take cost out... there are some near-term opportunities that are very big. — Darren Wells, Former Goodyear EVP / CFO, Jun 16 2021; We think it is very realistic intermediate term to get to that double-digit type margin again... the electric vehicle tires are going to be the next seed that helps us continue in that direction... — Darren Wells, Former Goodyear EVP / CFO, Feb 14 2022; ...that will put us in a really good spot to get to that 8% in, call it, the near term... And with 10%, it's a realistic possibility in more the intermediate term, call that 3 to 5 years. — Darren Wells, Former Goodyear EVP / CFO, Aug 5 2022"
"It is about as competitive as wealth management is in the United States. There is a lot of margin to be made and because of that there is a lot of competition. The U.S. market is really crowded. Some get big and some get destroyed. Most grow small segments in market niches, and then sell the company as their primary strategy. Everywhere is less competitive than the U.S. market. Over the last 15 years there has been an evolution to integrated software, integrated payments, cards on file, mobile, online, all these things really being supported by software as a service or ISV. Pivotal was not really a player in the ISV business and was just behind significantly in the technology delivery, integration, flexibility and products and services offered to the ISV market. They were lagging in that business and using a gateway company, Worldnet, as their primary infrastructure. Most other payment products in the market owned their own infrastructure. When you own the infrastructure, you get to decide ultimately the product roadmap as opposed to when you use a third party, you have to compete for products, services and direction. I would say you would see a decline in those numbers because that market is being dominated by their competitors. — Former Nuvei Executive"
""So as we look at that $2 billion run rate, I don't see any pie in the sky, we have got to go out and double margins in any one product, or have some ridiculous, unrealistic price increase or anything. These are all projects that have been announced...And it is just a question of executing on those...So I feel, today, even more confident in that number than I was when -- in March, when we gave that number to our investors." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO; "We've spent a lot of time with the investment community talking about a bridge, how we get from where we are to that $2 billion. I think if you dig into those numbers, you'll see that it's certainly achievable in the next 2 to 3 years." — John Heskett, VP – Treasury & Planning; "Our LTM is about $1.4 billion. We have an objective to go to $2 billion of EBITDA. Many of our businesses are sort of at that level...But really, on track we think near term to get to that $2 billion of EBITDA." — Kimo Esplin, CFO; "I would say that we should quite soundly beat the projections that we gave for the $2 billion. Again, we still have a great deal of confidence in the $2 billion number...I think that when we look at the overall composite, we still feel very confident about that." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO"
""My plan is to visit each refinery and talk to key refining and commercial personnel. These are the employees who will lead the significant margin and cost optimization improvements. It will only happen because of their experience and buy-in. They will know where the opportunities are and will want to be empowered to drive to a best-in-class performance." — Nominee 1; "I don’t see the value of the integration they claim to enjoy. Where is the evidence? It’s a different structure than Marathon or Valero – and they have been the better performers. I will insist that we take a harder look at this structure. The Board needs Directors with no pre-ordained conclusions." — Nominee 2; "Midstream businesses can be growth engines, but they need the right structure to compete. Phillips’ midstream business is constrained in so many ways in the current structure. I think people will be amazed at what is possible with these assets." — Nominee 3; "The lack of interest in Phillips’ stock from active managers is the market speaking to Company leadership. It is evident that the Phillips’ Board does not have its performance-driven and execution-focused mindset. I will make sure the Board doesn’t lose focus on investors’ views." — Nominee 4"
""We believe the management team at ADP has done an admirable job in proactively transforming ADP from a legacy payroll processor to a top HCM provider without sacrificing short-term results." — J.P. Morgan Research, August 16, 2017*; "Under an optimistic assumption, Ackman’s plan would take at least three years of depressed margins, but probably several more. We doubt management or its investors, including Pershing Square (despite claiming the opposite), would have the stomach for this... if Pershing Square is only looking at ADP through a spreadsheet, this plan makes perfect sense. However, companies don't exist on spreadsheets, and even the best laid plans often can't overcome an unhappy workforce worried about losing their jobs." — Morningstar Research, August 17, 2017*; "We do believe there are structural differences between ADP and PAYX margins, stemming from ADP's large presence in the national accounts and mid-market payroll services industry." — Evercore Research, August 17, 2017*; "ADP's Corporate Governance is a model for other companies... We doubt that many long-term shareholders would be anxious for a management change following the last six years of outperformance by ADP." — Baird Research, August 18, 2017*"
""In terms of exploration and production, we are different than the other independents. We are the most global." — John Hess, Chairman & CEO Hess, June 2010. "We want to maintain our global presence and our global reach because we believe that the globe provides many opportunities now and will also in the future. So we want to maintain that global scale and capability." — Gregory Hill, EVP Worldwide E&P Hess, November 2012. "We are skeptical that Hess's current global growth strategy will yield superior returns or growth, as its organization appears to be spread thin and we think it is unlikely that Hess can have a competitive advantage in all the areas it is pursuing." — Goldman Sachs, June 11, 2012. "On the upstream side, we question whether the company has the bandwidth to operate in over 20 countries...We do not believe a company of Hess's size will get credit in the market for a shotgun approach to investing across the world...Running such a diverse, global operation is challenging and given the size of the company it is not apparent that HES gains any incremental value from its integration and diversity. We believe this level of diversity has diminishing margins of return for investors." — Citigroup, June 20, 2012."
"My plan is to visit each refinery and talk to key refining and commercial personnel. These are the employees who will lead the significant margin and cost optimization improvements. It will only happen because of their experience and buy-in. They will know where the opportunities are and will want to be empowered to drive to a best-in-class performance. — Nominee 1; I don't see the value of the integration they claim to enjoy. Where is the evidence? It's a different structure than Marathon or Valero - and they have been the better performers. I will insist that we take a harder look at this structure. The Board needs Directors with no pre-ordained conclusions. — Nominee 2; Midstream businesses can be growth engines, but they need the right structure to compete. Phillips' midstream business is constrained in so many ways in the current structure. I think people will be amazed at what is possible with these assets. — Nominee 3; The lack of interest in Phillips' stock from active managers is the market speaking to Company leadership. It is evident that the Phillips' Board does not have its performance-driven and execution-focused mindset. I will make sure the Board doesn't lose focus on investors' views. — Nominee 4"
""First more than 90% of HomeTeam's business is Pest Control... When we acquired HomeTeam their margins were 7% on a trailing 12 month basis. But we believe that we can double those margins in the next four years." — Rollins On HomeTeam Acquisition, July 23, 2008. "The HomeTeam acquisition was a meaningful acquisition. So we've bought some nice platforms through the years, and we'll continue to buy good platforms." — CFO Krause, Baird Conference, Nov 9, 2022. "There are multiple benefits to tying Fox closely with HomeTeam, who have also been utilizing door-to-door campaigns to activate Taexx customers in their predominantly residential business for over 20 years." — CEO Gahlhoff, Q1 2023, April 27, 2023. "And when we look at the Fox pest control, it's a door-to-door business, the thing that we get excited about when we think about this business is teaming Fox with HomeTeam. HomeTeam is our business where we've got tubes and walls and there are legacy tubes that unfortunately, customers aren't using because they moved away from the home that they originally built and the new owner doesn't even realize that these tubes are in the house..." — Rollins on HomeTeam, William Blair Conf, Jun 8, 2023."
"“One of your most successful competitors [PCC] has a strategy of low prices and very high capacity utilization. You're bringing a lot of innovation and how met [ph] you acquired that -- strategy. But the other -- I got all the gross margin dollars over time. And how -- what assurance do you have that you can get your share of the gross margin dollars on these products over time to reward you for your innovation?” — Douglas Dethy, DC Capital; “And I think it would be wrong to go away with saying, hey, we are only going for markets where there is an innovation future because in the end, you saw also a lot of innovations are around process optimization, right? So in reality, they drive costs down. The ideal situation is to combine these worlds, and that's exactly what we're trying to do. I mean, we are at scale here. So scale-wise, I mean, we are at a level where we can do this. So it's not that we are not looking at utilization or factories, right, but what we have the advantage that we also have a lot of technology. So we want to get to a position where, ideally, we can combine those both worlds, where we can give the customer a value, at the same time, at lower costs.” — Dr. Klaus Kleinfeld"
""Let me make one comment on the Speedway deal relative to that is we still believe we're going to get the benefit of integration. That's not lost because of the supply agreement that we have and the fact that we'll continue to be using our logistics assets." — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum, August 3, 2020. "I mentioned Speedway sale is a win-win, I think at the end of the day 7-Eleven is getting a quality team and a group of assets that enhance their portfolio, at the same time MPC is monetizing the retail margin, but keeping the fuel supply chain." — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum, November 2, 2020. "On the portfolio we completed the Speedway sale receiving $17.2 billion of proceeds from that transaction and securing the 15-year fuel supply agreement with 7-Eleven." — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum, February 2, 2022. "If you think about the history of the Speedway portfolio literally growing up over decades in and around the infrastructure. So it's important to us to preserve the integration value operationally associated with that, which we've done so in the contract." — Brian Partee, Senior Vice President, Marketing of Marathon Petroleum, August 3, 2020."
"“Let me make one comment on the Speedway deal relative to that is we still believe we're going to get the benefit of integration. That's not lost because of the supply agreement that we have and the fact that we'll continue to be using our logistics assets.” — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum, August 3, 2020; “I mentioned Speedway sale is a win-win, I think at the end of the day 7-Eleven is getting a quality team and a group of assets that enhance their portfolio, at the same time MPC is monetizing the retail margin, but keeping the fuel supply chain.” — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum, November 2, 2020; “On the portfolio we completed the Speedway sale receiving $17.2 billion of proceeds from that transaction and securing the 15-year fuel supply agreement with 7-Eleven.” — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum, February 2, 2022; “If you think about the history of the Speedway portfolio literally growing up over decades in and around the infrastructure. So it's important to us to preserve the integration value operationally associated with that, which we've done so in the contract.” — Brian Partee, Senior Vice President, Marketing of Marathon Petroleum, August 3, 2020"
"“I think it’s about control. So, if you can control the surgeon, the team, the airplane - everything - as a consumer, I’m stuck. I might know what the cost would be, but then there are all these delays. Sometimes, we can’t even get a plane because of the delay in the procuring arena where we have to then field another jet because we’ve got 90 minutes. So, that adds to the additional cost, too. But I would say when it comes down to why their team needs to be the one and only to make the decision, I think that’s a control thing. I think that’s them making the call. And I have no control over that.” — Veteran transplant administrator/executive at Massachusetts General Hospital; “...so there may be a feeling of being kind of forced or leveraged into taking on that service. At some point, the cost, the economic analysis—I think they’re bordering on eating into all of the margin or most of the margin that would be gotten from doing another case of liver transplantation. I think that when you start pushing up against that, at least as an institution, you have to start asking the question, is this viable?” — Transplant hepatologist in a leadership role at Massachusetts General Hospital"
"As Steve said at Investor Day, we introduced a new transaction model for Flex, which gives Autodesk a more direct relationship with its customers and more closely integrates with its channel partners. We began testing the new transaction model across our product suite in Australia a couple of weeks ago. Assuming the launch proceeds as expected, in fiscal '25 and '26, we intend to transition our indirect business to the new transaction model in all our major markets globally. In the new transaction model, partners provide a quote to customers but the actual transaction happens directly between Autodesk and the customer... In the near term, the new transaction model results in a shift from contra revenue to operating costs that provide a tailwind to revenue growth, while being broadly neutral to operating profit and free cash flow dollars, and mechanically result in percent operating margins taking a step or 2 backwards. Over the long term, optimization enabled by this transition will provide a tailwind to revenue, operating income and free cash flow dollars, even after the cost of setting up our building platform. — Andrew Anagnost, CEO, November 21, 2023"
"“On valuation, despite an earnings profile (25% commodity / 75% specialty) in-line with differentiated peers Celanese (8.3x '22E EBITDA) and Eastman (9.2x '22E EBITDA), Huntsman (6.1x '22E EBITDA) continues to trade more like a commodity chemical company (Lyondell: 5.4x '22E EBITDA)” — Deutsche Bank, February 2022; “We view multiple expansion to more closely in line with diversified chemical peers Celanese (CE) and Eastman (EMN) as still more reflective of a blue sky scenario. Although both of those companies have similar mix of commodity/specialty businesses, they trade at higher multiples (currently ~9x EV/EBITDA NTM) as a result of their higher margin structures (mid to low 20s EBITDA margins vs. Huntsman's mid-teens levels).” — Morgan Stanley, November 2021; “HUN's Nov. 9 investor day will be first deep-dive since May 2018. Since then HUN divested the bulk of its commodity chems (~8x EV/EBITDA) & consumer adhesives (~15x) exposure & acquired bolt-on specialty polyurethanes & epoxies (~8x post synergies)... Specialties vs. basics mix is most often compared to EMN & CE (i.e. integrated acetyls v integrated MDI at HUN).” — UBS, August 2021"
"“On valuation, despite an earnings profile (25% commodity / 75% specialty) in-line with differentiated peers Celanese (8.3x '22E EBITDA) and Eastman (9.2x '22E EBITDA), Huntsman (6.1x '22E EBITDA) continues to trade more like a commodity chemical company (Lyondell: 5.4x '22E EBITDA)” — Deutsche Bank, February 2022; “We view multiple expansion to more closely in line with diversified chemical peers Celanese (CE) and Eastman (EMN) as still more reflective of a blue sky scenario. Although both of those companies have similar mix of commodity/specialty businesses, they trade at higher multiples (currently ~9x EV/EBITDA NTM) as a result of their higher margin structures (mid to low 20s EBITDA margins vs. Huntsman's mid-teens levels).” — Morgan Stanley, November 2021; “HUN's Nov. 9 investor day will be first deep-dive since May 2018. Since then HUN divested the bulk of its commodity chems (~8x EV/EBITDA) & consumer adhesives (~15x) exposure & acquired bolt-on specialty polyurethanes & epoxies (~8x post synergies)... Specialties vs. basics mix is most often compared to EMN & CE (i.e. integrated acetyls v integrated MDI at HUN).” — UBS, August 2021"
"they made a multitude of offers to try to get us to basically purchase more equipment. — Marvell executive; other concessions were made like extended warranty service...at no additional cost...even guaranteeing service time like 60-70%...if not then we could take some kind of reimbursement...for the lost time of use — Marvell executive; they would actually swap out the A150 that we have with an A300 at a discounted price...because they wanted to try to get early purchase volume. — Marvell executive; we haven't seen real proof of concept and enough case studies to actually show the real-world application of it versus the A150. — Marvell executive; I can tell you right off the bat...they haven't taken any impairments against their balance sheet, so they're probably over-valuing their inventory far greater than it's actually worth...a lot of these companies are sitting on so much inventory.... — Marvell executive; is a common thing, unfortunately, that I've seen across multiple companies in the space...to manipulate earnings: they defer out...that impairment...because they don't want to record a hit on their gross margin. — Marvell executive"
""...we announced the acquisition of Ciba's textile effects business. This was an acquisition of roughly $255 million with an $88 million LTM EBITDA. It is our objective over the course of the next two years to invest about $100 million into that textile effects business, and we believe we can get that EBITDA up to about 15%, 16% of sales; increase that EBITDA from its present rate of about $90 million run rate, upwards of about $150 million run rate." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO, September 2006; "We are doing the very same thing in textile effects where over the next two years, we're going to spend $150 million and take an EBITDA that is roughly $80 million and we're going to take it to $150 million of EBITDA." — Kimo Esplin, CFO, March 2007; "...our textile effects business continues to make good progress on the restructuring program that we kicked off this last year. Our goal is to capture $75 million in cost savings and drive EBITDA margins to the mid-teens. In fact SG&A and R&D costs in the textile effects declined by almost $9 million or 17% as compared to second quarter levels." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO, July 2007"
""Let me make one comment on the Speedway deal relative to that is we still believe we're going to get the benefit of integration. That's not lost because of the supply agreement that we have and the fact that we'll continue to be using our logistics assets." — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum, August 3, 2020; "I mentioned Speedway sale is a win-win, I think at the end of the day 7-Eleven is getting a quality team and a group of assets that enhance their portfolio, at the same time MPC is monetizing the retail margin, but keeping the fuel supply chain." — Mike Hennigan, November 2, 2020; "On the portfolio we completed the Speedway sale receiving $17.2 billion of proceeds from that transaction and securing the 15-year fuel supply agreement with 7-Eleven." — Mike Hennigan, February 2, 2022; "If you think about the history of the Speedway portfolio literally growing up over decades in and around the infrastructure. So it's important to us to preserve the integration value operationally associated with that, which we've done so in the contract." — Brian Partee, Senior Vice President, Marketing of Marathon Petroleum, August 3, 2020"
"“Let me make one comment on the Speedway deal relative to that is we still believe we're going to get the benefit of integration. That's not lost because of the supply agreement that we have and the fact that we'll continue to be using our logistics assets.” — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum. “I mentioned Speedway sale is a win-win, I think at the end of the day 7-Eleven is getting a quality team and a group of assets that enhance their portfolio, at the same time MPC is monetizing the retail margin, but keeping the fuel supply chain.” — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum. “On the portfolio we completed the Speedway sale receiving $17.2 billion of proceeds from that transaction and securing the 15-year fuel supply agreement with 7-Eleven.” — Mike Hennigan, CEO of Marathon Petroleum. “If you think about the history of the Speedway portfolio literally growing up over decades in and around the infrastructure. So it's important to us to preserve the integration value operationally associated with that, which we've done so in the contract.” — Brian Partee, Senior Vice President, Marketing of Marathon Petroleum."
""And were those things that were not addressed as you were inside ADP, or are these things that are incrementally directed towards how you are going to grow the business? In other words, did ADP kind of take a step back and say you are growing at the average rate, at corporate average margins and we are happy with that and focus on other areas? How did they view the business when it was tucked inside that company?" — Brian Bissett, Morgan Stanley. "I've been with ADP a long time. ADP does a real good job of trying to look at ways to maximize margins, but you do it on a cadence that perhaps isn't at a pace that we are going to try to accelerate. And because we are independent we can do some things if we have to restructure and the like. Perhaps that wasn't top of the list under the ADP umbrella, but it might be on ours. And so we're going to take advantage of, if you will, a fresh look at all areas and I think that's healthy for the business. Under ADP, good kinds, good direction, but a cadence that perhaps wasn't as accelerated as what we're going to try to do for this business." — Steven Anenen, CDK Global, Former CEO"
""GCP will focus largely on the non-residential construction market, with a smaller business in packaging materials as ballast. Longer-term, GCP should be able to lean on its market leading position and new product pipeline to out-pace end market growth, support margins, and grow EPS at an estimated 10% CAGR through the end of the decade." — Jefferies, February 2016; "We view this US non-residential construction exposure (particularly exposure to cement and concrete demand) as a positive, since cement volumes are still 25% below levels 10 years ago and 3% below the 20-year average prior to the 2008/09 recession." — Goldman Sachs, February 2016; "Despite some indications that non-residential construction spending growth in the U.S. could be entering a mature phase of the cycle, there are some spots of steady growth in significant markets for GCP, such as the multifamily market and infrastructure spending with the passage of the Federal Aid Highway Program. These markets may help to boost overall growth above rates for total construction, in our opinion." — KeyBanc Capital Markets, May 2016"
"“they were replacing them every, give or take, two weeks...being able to work on the system became rather challenging.” — Former field service engineer. “you replace the collector and send it to Germany”; “I’ve seen a bunch of these unbelievable amounts of collectors there from Lasertec”; “it costs hundreds of thousands of dollars” to clean each collector every month; “takes almost two days to chisel all this debris.” — Industry executive. “I’m telling you, the problem...started two years ago and they said that we cannot ship...they are not shipping because it’s a liability...it’s consuming all the margin.” — Industry executive. “...it coats the source of the EUV light until it develops a few mono-layers of coating...and gradually you lose it...and have to replace it”: “I heard every year that they have to replace the optics...the refurbishing of those optics costs at least a million dollars or more...they need to replace mirror number two, mirror number four, and that could cost at least half a million dollars each.” — Research interview."
""Strategically, the combination of PEP's SnackCo and MDLZ would create a global snack giant with leading market share positions across several sub-snack categories, with limited portfolio overlap." — Judy Hong, Goldman Sachs 3.25.13; "Assuming ~$3+ billion in 2016 synergies, a 25% deal premium... we determine that a PEP acquisition of MDLZ could be accretive by ~15%-20% in the first full year." — Alexia Howard, Ali Dibadj, Steve Powers, Bernstein 4.22.13; "The potential for revenue synergies could reach ~$3 billion, based on the benchmark set by Mondelez / Cadbury." — Kevin Grundy, Dara Mohsenian and Matthew Grainger, Morgan Stanley 3.25.13; "The cost synergy opportunity is real. In our work published a few weeks ago, we embedded 9% of Mondelez revenues as synergies (or $3.4B)." — Bill Pecoriello, Consumer Edge 3.17.13; "A Merger Could Yield Significant Cost Savings: ...MDLZ's overall margins are well below those of its scaled global Food peers... leaving significant runway for cost savings, in our view." — Andrew Lazar, Barclays 3.22.13"
"“They absolutely would take it because it represents - even if it's a wash financially, it gets your numbers up, particularly if you're not already a high-volume center. You get your numbers up. You will, in the eyes of your institution and of payors, take on enhanced status, at least for being viewed as a higher volume center and potentially can enhance your margins accordingly. In a way, this is kind of like a loss leader where you've got to do a bunch of these perfusion-supported cases so that you can put yourself in a position to compete for contracts so that you can get even more of the conventional risk cases that don't require perfusion. In a way, it's kind of like one way of getting the good stuff, so to speak, to take on larger numbers aided and abetted and improved by perfusion It's a really interesting calculus that's being practiced by these kinds of centers that want to get bigger.” — Transplant hepatologist in a leadership role at Harvard/Massachusetts General Hospital; key role in oversight of the liver transplant program"
"“So we’re definitely not subsidizing anybody else's drug discovery [...] In terms of our ability or our willingness to be flexible on economic terms, we are very flexible. But there's definitely a red line where any deal has to pay for our cost, right? So the bare minimum. We're not going to do a deal that's not a gross margin positive. We're not in the business of subsidizing our customers' research.” — Twist CEO, Q2 2022 earnings call on May 5, 2022. “They have a very, very large and complicated manufacturing scheme where they overbuild in order to deliver the product [...] The thing I kept on saying is they were shipping with every gene and every oligo pool a $20 bill to people. That's basically that they were fundamentally flawed, that they were trying to keep up with the price, and they were taking it as a loss every time. But what they have never done is fix the fundamental manufacturing flaw that they have. They need to overbuild or do extensive rework in order to deliver these products.” — Longtime executive in Twist's space."
""Our LTM is about $1.4 billion. We have an objective to go to $2 billion of EBITDA. Many of our businesses are sort of at that level...But really, on track we think near term to get to that $2 billion of EBITDA." — Kimo Esplin, CFO; "I would say that we should quite soundly beat the projections that we gave for the $2 billion. Again, we still have a great deal of confidence in the $2 billion number...I think that when we look at the overall composite, we still feel very confident about that." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO; "About a year ago, at our Investor Day, we introduced to the market our near-term EBITDA target of $2 billion. We believed that we could achieve this number in the next two to three years...we continue to target a $2 billion run rate in 2017." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO; "If we look at our business without our existing Ti02 division, we would be looking at 2016 as a record year for...EBITDA margins, a materially different and stronger company than we what we have today." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO"
""We are not surprised to see the involvement of an activist...An activist investor presents Box with an opportunity to improve sales execution...We note that Box has one of the lowest sales efficiencies across our entire coverage universe." — D.A. Davidson, September 2019; "...we’re not at all surprised that value-oriented investors have taken a significant stake...with Box spending ~41% of revenue on sales and marketing (higher than most SaaS peers in the ~30% range), we think a shift towards margin expansion could provide an avenue for unlocking shareholder value." — Raymond James, September 2019; "Although we have maintained a positive view on Box’s positioning and product portfolio, the company’s go-to-market execution has been consistently disappointing...if the solution selling strategy under COO Stephanie Carullo fails to materialize in a meaningful reacceleration in growth, we would expect Starboard to increasingly pressure Box’s management team to reevaluate its growth vs. margin framework." — Wells Fargo, September 2019"
""And if we were a business today that we're separated from our TiO2, we would be going into 2016 saying...2016 will be a record EBITDA margin year in the history of this company." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO; "...as much as this is a business that when you start looking at the core performance, if you look at Huntsman without TiO2, we would be going into 2016 here...with some of the highest margins we've ever had in our history and with better than GDP growth." — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO; "So I'll end my remarks on where I started with wanting this slide to be emblazoned in your mind. Again, as I look at the 4 steps that I think get this company another $20 to $30 a share, I think that these are all eminently doable." — Peter Huntsman, Chairman, President & CEO; "We remain very confident in delivering on the 2020 plans that we shared with you then. We are committed to the significant value creation upside of more than $27 per share by the end of 2020." — Peter Huntsman, Chairman, President & CEO"
""It takes five years to six years for a first program in a vertical to steady state, to get to that sort of natural peak of annual enrollment. It takes four-ish years for those programs to breakeven. But as they steady state, it is our expectation that an average 2U program will generate $16 million in top line revenue and generate mid-30s adjusted EBITDA margins." — 2017 Investor Day - 10/05/17; "So for our first program, our cumulative net negative cash investment is typically in the range of $10 million before we get to adjusted EBITDA and cash flow breakeven. . .launching a second, third or fourth program in the vertical however, our cumulative net negative cash investment usually falls by about half, more in the range of $5 million. . . the roughly $5 million to $10 million in cumulative net negative cash flow we refer to, is not an upfront investment with additional negative cash flows expected. It is the total cash investment we expect to make to a program breakeven." — Oppenheimer Conference 8/10/15"
""We have recently started to see relief with declines in the cost of oil-related products, but those decreases are just now starting to make their way into our finished goods?" — WD-40 CFO, Q1 Jan 2009. "If oil stays down and we get the conversion, given that and the savings that we anticipate from the improved manufacturing process from the capital equipment we have invested on our package lines to improve line speed from smart straw, all of those things aligned, we should see some sort of at least stabilization and improvement in our gross margin, particularly in the second quarter." — WD-40 CEO, Q1 Jan 2009. "We also began to see some relief from lower oil costs versus the first quarter although our oil costs in the second quarter were higher than they were in the same period last fiscal year." — WD-40 CEO, Q2 April 2009. "The cost of oil based materials in our Q3 cost of goods reflected the lower pricing of Q2 and positively impacted our gross margin by two percentage points" — WD-40 CFO, Q3 July 2009."
""The Cintas legacy gross margins continue to expand and the G&K gross margins will too as we realize the acquisition synergies." — Cintas CFO, Q1 2018 Earnings Call, Sept 26, 2017; "While the assimilation of the G&K business continues at a great pace -- Mike mentioned 95% of duplicate operations have been closed, more work remains. The G&K gross margins will improve to Cintas legacy levels as we further integrate this business and we increasingly realize more of the synergies. We are on track." — Cintas Treasurer, Q3 2018 Earnings Call, March 22, 2018; "Really, nice job. At this point, given the gross margins, is it fair to say -- and I know we're not just [interviewing] G&K, but is G&K up to the corporate average at this point? Or would you expect that to get continue to kind of narrow relative to where Cintas is relative to GK?" — Analyst Kevin Damien McVeigh, Q1 2020 Earnings Call, Sept 24, 2019; "Well, as you referred to (gross margins), it's really hard to say." — CFO Response, Q1 2020 Earnings Call."
"“It's 3 years behind Facebook and Google” — Industry feedback; “Why are they investing in Search and making search part of it?” “They don't understand search” — Industry feedback; “Until they reverse their user and engagement trends, their ad products don't matter” — Industry feedback; “They need to consolidate one ad tech platform like Google has AdWords. Cross-integrate it.” — Industry feedback; “They have all the data they need but they don't employ people to understand how to analyze it” — Industry feedback; “The revenue they claim to have here replaced Display ads which were higher margin.” — Industry feedback; “Flurry people are great at analytics but don't understand how to monetize” — Industry feedback; “We don't understand why they recently renegotiated the Microsoft search deal the way they did” — Industry feedback; “Why aren't they building a Syndication Team to sell display ads for others?” — Industry feedback; “For employing so many people, they don't know a lot” — Industry feedback"