Callouts & quotes from 37,061+ activist slides

"This is A CLASSIC sign of underperforming companies – Domestic Buyside Analyst; Not enough compensation is tied to stock performance. – Foreign Buyside Analyst; It needs to make the evaluations and the process clearer – Domestic Buyside Analyst"

"The company is focused on ramping production of Teal’s next generation system to meet the Army’s currently stated acquisition objective for 5,880 systems, which is subject to change over the 5 year period of performance. — Red Cat press release"

""Zillow continues to double down on its mortgage business, this time by compelling Flex teams to send back leads that have expressed interest in learning more about Zillow Home Loans – or risk getting kicked out of the program." — Mike DelPrete"

"“we can convert different blood types to an O blood type...we can actually make changes in the genetic makeup of the donor organ...we can add genes...silence genes...those foreign proteins that were the cause of rejection.” — Dr. Abbas Ardehali"

"Longitudinal mean fasting glucose (FG) and HbA1c increased slightly over the initial 6-9 months but stabilized or returned to near-baseline levels upon continued DCCR dosing (Figure 1 and Figure 2). — May 16, 2024 poster by Gevers, Miller et al"

"“if you have hyperglycemia and diabetes, and you have edema and heart failure, and I do believe there were a couple of patients hospitalized with heart failure just to reduce appetite, it may not be a risk worth taking.” — Ex-Soleno employee #1"

"“the drug and the disease are not compatible, so don’t try it based on the physiology of the drug and the lack of that physiology that works normally in the patient.” — Trial investigator and physician; one of the leading KOL’s in the PWS field"

"Over 25% of Distributors reach the rank of Supervisor and above (“Leader”), qualifying them for additional compensation which is paid by Herbalife based upon the sales production of those they have sponsored directly and indirectly. — Herbalife"

"Phillips 66’s (NYSE: PSX) CEOs reaped an eye-popping $140M from 2020-2024—despite ongoing stock and operating underperformance and missed cost targets. Why are shareholders footing the bill for big CEO paydays in the face of lackluster returns?"

"reconstitute itself and upgrade the Company's leadership such that it can objectively assess the best path forward for Southwest's shareholders, employees, and customers. We believe this process needs to commence immediately. — Artisan Partners"

"Anytime you can sell a volume of MDI on a rail car basis on a long-term fixed contract basis, that's going to be something we like. So not everything has to go through a system house... — Peter Huntsman, Chairman, President & CEO, December 2019"

"Согласно Постановлению Правительства РФ от 27.10.2025 г. № 1668 заселение в гостиницу производится при предъявлении оригинала внутреннего паспорта / заграничного паспорта гражданина РФ, либо (с 01.01.2026) оригинала водительского удостоверения."

"There is tangible evidence that warm weather is affecting WTRG, ultimately reducing the need for natural gas consumption. The CEO recently punted on discussing the impact to their outlook despite 20% warmer weather than normal. Wonder why....?"

"Based on the problematic Site Sharing portfolio, we believe that the above market rent that AMT is currently receiving, which amounts to 43% of operating revenue, is unsustainable and any average rent metrics based off this will be overstated."

"While there is no definitive link between Aquablation and the potential spread of cancer cells in the event the patient had undiagnosed prostate cancer, we found persistent fears among some urologists that the procedure could have that result."

"IQVIA's increasing reliability as an indicator of Penumbra sales makes us confident that the consistent sales decline indicated through recent months is a signal of a genuine downward inflection in Penumbra's U.S. growth, if not a contraction."

"To fulfill these duties, the UNP Board must address eight years of staggering underperformance and immediately make a change in leadership. It is imperative for the Board to pair the best railroad in North America with the best leadership team"

"In Albania, there was ultimately a media firestorm over the controversial concession, with various media referring to the concession as a “theft”, the collusion behind the concession award a “mafia”, and repeatedly calling the award “corrupt”."

"Based on our diligence, we believe that a significant portion of LSS's historical underperformance and market share loss has been self-inflicted and driven by organizational dysfunction – and is therefore reversible under the right leadership."

"70% of AMR's Annual Incentive Bonus is tied to EBITDA and Cost of Coal Sales Per Ton. As we pointed out earlier, neither metric incorporates the cost of operating its key DTA asset that facilitates over $1.7 billion of AMR's export coal sales."

"WSP’s Canadian SEDAR regulatory filings make no mention of Cyprus and notice carefully the spelling of the entity “WSPGRP” in contrast to other WSP entity names in the organization charts, may make it more difficult to search for and identify."

"Tellingly, HASI chooses to paint a misleadingly positive financial picture. HASI is permitted two tools that would clarify its reported financials: EMI balance impairments and adjustments to the liquidation basis. HASI chooses not to use them."

"That Company management is kept within the hands of a tight-knit Israeli team located far from the rest of the business, and that it offers limited visibility into managerial decisions among people outside of this network, is a red flag to us."

"By factoring in the U.K. pension debt, we estimate Saputo's true Net Debt / EBITDA leverage to be 3.5x. Looked at another way, with over $4.5 billion in net debt, each manufacturing facility is indebted $68m and every employee by almost $240k."

"TWC, like its closest comparable Comcast, should not consider a regular dividend on its common stock assuming either the capital structure as currently proposed by management or a more appropriately levered one as highlighted in this analysis."

"Overall, we find that closed-end PERE [private equity real estate] funds have underperformed listed REITs, even before adjusting for risk, leverage, illiquidity, and the uncertain investment timing associated with unfunded capital commitments."

"Two of Guillermo's co-defendants from his 2008 securities fraud case, Angel Romo and Jesus Gutierrez, continued to have long careers with Transamerica, only leaving in recent months, leading us to question Transamerica’s agent vetting process."

"A 2018 shareholder proposal to declassify PPG’s Board received overwhelming support (99% of votes cast in favor), but insufficient voter turnout resulted in the proposal’s failure... a greater effort should be made to reach retail investors(1)"

"Spruce Point views MSCI change of practices from providing margin targets to focusing on Adj. EPS as a major red flag. We later illustrate why we believe MSCI's margins are highly susceptible to potential manipulation through cost allocations."

"Spruce Point questions the inclusion of Rajat Taneja on the Audit Committee. By background, Mr. Taneja is a credit card and gaming technologist and has never held a finance, accounting, audit or financial reporting role that we could identify."

"A November 2022 report by the Markup found that Intuit peers TaxAct, TaxSlayer, and H&R Block used website pixels to collect and send sensitive personal financial information to Meta and Google, which resulted in a Congressional investigation."

"Notice how Mettler's 2018 annual report obfuscates the Q4'18 impact of Biotix, by referencing its performance with Troemner. Troemner was acquired in August of 2016, so why is Mettler mixing its contribution with Biotix almost 2.5 years later?"

"BR promoted Itiviti as a 30%+ operating margin business when announcing the acquisition in late March 2021. However, when its audited and pro forma financials were later filed with the SEC, we see that its operating margins were closer to 20%."

"Extrapolating the anticipated Q1 18% sales contraction throughout the year would suggest that full-year FY20 sales could be as low as $276M - and this is before taking into account the potential effects of the pandemic on business performance."

"Evidence shows that sell-side analysts heavily promoted Stryker's acquisition of Mobius and Cardan Robotics, issuing glowing reports about how Cardan "significantly bolsters" its robotics expertise and made a "differentiated bet" in the space."

"It's worth highlighting that K2M Group’s co-founder and Chief Medical Officer was cited for having an abnormally large number of malpractice lawsuits against him, some of which were still in litigation at the time K2M was incorporated in 2004."

"The relationship between Shujia's year-end deferred revenue and subsequent-year recognized revenue is inconsistent with our understanding of how GZ 1-1 operates, supporting our view that Shujia was not consolidating all of the GZ 1-1 business."

"SCT's capital allocation framework and the strategic rationale behind it are vague and confusing. None of the free cash flow generated by the operating businesses is returned to shareholders causing many to ignore the value of those businesses"

"Spruce Point believes it is a huge red flag that Bunge failed to provide revenue projections for Viterra in its proxy statement which it likely had formulated if it were able to provide Adj. EBIT, EBITDA and Unlevered Free Cash Flow estimates."

"PLUG likely would not have been able to secure these deals without offering warrants to Walmart and Amazon. Yet management believes that it should get full credit for this as revenue, AND that the warrants should not count against gross profit"

"We note that the basis of efficacy and FDA approval is nothing more than a sharp and rather fortuitous separation in HQ-CT scores in placebo arm (n=39) vs. DCCR (n=38) in the last 4 weeks of the 16-week withdrawal period (+4.5 pbo, +0.4 DCCR)."

"Our sample is broad across geography and practice settings, representative, and captures the prevalent mood in the field toward Vykat, as the physicians we interviewed are highly-networked within the small world of PWS specialists and clinics."

"More comments to the same post – “a roller coaster ride over here…some days the hyperphagia is the worst it’s ever been”; “this is worrisome with more people saying this”; “the food seeking has now reached a level I didn’t think was possible.”"

"we see Dr Miller and we have ZERO plans on giving our 10 year old son this medication for many reasons...the side effects are very concerning to us...we might consider it but only at a point of desperation when we have exhausted other options."

"Prescribing only because of patient desperation and pressure; doesn't think it has much benefit and is “trying to undersell the expectations”; forced to prescribe only because there's a new FDA approval; doesn't “disagree” with insurer denials"

"He also expressed skepticism of pitolisant’s published hERG/cardiac safety study, calling the methodology old-school and primitive, and stated that he “would be surprised” if pitolisant “would get a passing grade” now on cardiovascular safety."

"In fact, this new disclosure proves absolutely nothing - it is an unverifiable, unaudited table of numbers in which QTT fails to even name the "state-owned and reputable financial institutions in the PRC" that supposedly hold ~75% of its cash."

"Disney may believe that price increases and “nickel-and-diming” of Cast Members and other costs is good for the bottom line... however, we suspect it is short-term thinking that puts the brand value and long-term health of the business at risk"

"Warning: Why Are Charges From 2015/16 Restructuring Programs Suddenly Ignored? Per the 2015 10-K: Charges From 2015/16 Were Expected “To Continue Through 2016 and be substantially complete by 2016” – Not 2018! — Spruce Point Capital Management"

""We have paid dividends consecutively for 76 years, and our Board of Directors recognizes the value that our common shareholders place on both our historical payment record and on our future anticipated dividend payments" — Essential Utilities"

"The investment in PR-NA Industries, which has a negative net equity of Euro 1.5m and for which there is no legal or statutory obligation to recapitalize, had already been fully written down in previous years. — 2020 PR Industrial S.R.L Filings"

"As a former Director of Operations for a leading casual dining chain put it, franchising gives a corporation dozens of R&D departments, all directly connected to the customer on a daily basis, rather than one R&D department stuck at corporate."

"“Only, it wasn't clear VW had validated Quantumscape's cells” — Steve LeVine. “Again, VW seemed to be backing away from any concrete assurances about when or if QuantumScape's material will find itself into a VW Group vehicle.” — Steve LeVine."

"Revenue is recognized upon transfer of control of promised products or services to customers in an amount that reflects the consideration we expect to receive in exchange for those products or services. — PowerSchool Revenue Recognition Policy"

"As a former Director of Operations for a leading casual dining chain put it, franchising gives a corporation dozens of R&D departments, all directly connected to the customer on a daily basis, rather than one R&D department stuck at corporate."

"Zebra describes its Chief Accounting Officer (“CAO”) as comfortable operating in “gray areas” and “willing to tailor accounting practices to business processes versus having to re-engineer business processes.” — Spruce Point Capital Management"

"On November 21, 2019, the Company purchased 1,000 shares of SCP Reflets, making it the only shareholder. Subsequently on November 29, 2019, the Company sold 1 SCP Reflets share to CPI FIM SA. — Pietroni 2019 Financial Statements, Note 4.2 p. 7"

""In addition approximately $37 million of the increase is the result of taking ownership of inventory from China when it ships versus when it enters our distribution center here in the US." — Many Fields, ELF Q2 FY24 Earnings Call Nov. 1, 2023"

"“Approximately, 94% of our GAAP revenue was recurring subscription revenue...Hims & Hers brings together the best of high-growth consumer Internet coupled with the fundamental economics of enterprise SaaS.” — CEO Dudum on Q3 2021 Earnings Call"

"The Amdocs deal reports, in which it reported a 16% drop in billing revenue, to $251 million. Comverse does not fill any gaps in Amdocs' technology portfolio, nor was it a competitive threat to Amdocs. — Sheryl Kingstone, 451 Research director"