Callouts & quotes from 1,069+ activist slides

"Given the recent deterioration of the Exchange's financial performance and historical precedent, we believe it is increasingly likely that ERIE's management fee will decline for the first time in decades which could reset earnings expectations by approximately 20% and slow premium growth at the Exchange over the coming years."

"Unfortunately, execution has fallen well short of expectations, with last year's annual billings growth below 10% for the first time in the Company's public history, continued negative GAAP earnings, and a share price that is still below where it closed after its first day of trading following its IPO more than six years ago."

"Generac: "Raising sales guidance net sales are now expected to increase between 36% to 40% from the previous guidance of net sales growth between 32% to 36% and assumes shipments of residential products increased at a mid- to high 40% rate during 2022, up from prior expectation for a low 40% rate." — Generac Q1 2022 Conf Call"

"The article stated that “the Chinese authorities suspended the registration and approval of direct selling amid a nationwide crackdown on wrongdoing in the health products market”, and this means Morinda and other direct-selling companies in China are not expected to increase their presence in cities/provinces any time soon."

"Analyst: “We always talk about incremental margins with you.... You got all this operating leverage. How do we think about operating margin then?” Mark Donegan (PCC CEO): “And again they move, but I think that the range in which you should expect to see it move is somewhere between that 35% and 45%, 48%.” — December 3, 2014"

"We find it remarkable that Samsara has continued to trade at a premium valuation despite embodying all the attributes that have traditionally resulted in valuation multiple discounts: SMB focus, hardware business, and communications focus. Thus, we expect Samsara’s eventual multiple compression will be particularly severe."

"[T]hose quantities of oil and gas, which ... can be estimated with reasonable certainty to be economically producible ... under existing economic conditions [...] [E]conomically producible ... a resource which generates revenue that exceeds, or is reasonably expected to exceed, the costs of the operation. — SEC Definition"

""Those on Wall Street cannot resume taking risks without regard for the consequences, and expect that next time, American taxpayers will be there to break the fall." — President Obama. "For a market to function, those who invest and lend in that market must believe that their money is actually at risk." — President Obama."

"…We find many of your responses to the shareholders’ concerns to be misleading, self serving, and defensive…Given the inconsistencies in many of your recent communications, we expect that the shareholders would welcome Elliott’s nominees to the Board to ensure proper and timely execution and to avoid risk of backsliding."

"it's pretty quiet overall... what I'm not hearing people say, when can I get my hands on Vykat? Because we all know diazoxide, and we all know the problems with it. It's not like we're clueless. I'll put it this way...this somewhat surprising and out of the blue approval that I don't think any of us were quite expecting."

""In the fourth quarter of 2022, we executed multiple restructuring programs to lower costs, increase margins and position us for growth resulting in restructuring and impairment expenses of $35 million. We expect to fully execute our restructuring initiatives and programs over the next 12-24 months." — Resideo 2022 10-K"

"Warning: If in fact Oatly is right and that it will never be able to supply enough oat milk, then we believe its future will be doomed. We expect competitors will continue to fill the void and take market share. In the long run, we see a real possibility that Oatly is squeezed out of the market and towards insolvency."

"Notably, with much of Hill-Rom's c-suite fairly new to the business, we believe that – with much of its long-term equity incentives locked up for several years at least – management has incentive to re-set expectations to manageable targets now, rather than leave investors expecting Hill-Rom to hit unattainable goals."

"Notably, with much of Hill-Rom's c-suite fairly new to the business, we believe that – with much of its long-term equity incentives locked up for several years at least – management has incentive to re-set expectations to manageable targets now, rather than leave investors expecting Hill-Rom to hit unattainable goals."

"In Q3 2021, Nuvei made another modification to its “Focus on High Growth Verticals” slide. Looking carefully, we see it now removed the sales TAM per vertical in addition to the CAGR expectation. Furthermore, Nuvei no longer makes the statement of “tremendous upside from continuing to gain share in a massive market.”"

"There is clear evidence that HSB penetration is falling behind Generac's internal expectations. Notice carefully, Generac recently revised a key slide that lowered the penetration rate from 5.75% to 5.50%. Also, Generac is claiming that the highest penetrated markets in the U.S. are 15-20%+, down from “nearing 20%”"

"We believe that the FY25 revenue guidance increase earlier this month of $10 million is substantially explained by the expected contributions from the Ambry Genetics acquisition and the new Pathos/AstraZeneca deal, two factors that we estimate should have added nearly $46 million to projected revenue for the year."

"Kalamazoo, Michigan - June 25, 2018 - Stryker Corporation (NYSE:SYK) announced today a definitive agreement to acquire SafeAir AG... The transaction is subject to customary closing conditions and is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2018. — Timothy J. Scannell, Group President, MedSurg and Neurotechnology"

"Not only has Heska had challenges growing organically, but the Company's profit margins have declined materially since peaking in 2017. Both absolute margins and margin expansion since 2019 trail IDEXX Labs by a wide margin. Investors should be concerned that margins are not expected to improve for several years."

"Spruce Point believes that Dollarama is significantly overvalued based on its undifferentiated and increasingly uncompetitive business model, inflated and unsustainable margins which are posed to decline, and its limited growth prospects which will restrain its ability to hit its long-term earnings expectations."

"“Let me be very clear. The foundational plan that we have that we launched the IPO on [...] is delivering on expectation. We've seen that in the last four quarters. You've seen that in our guidance. We see no change to our foundational plan and feel very good about it.” — Acquisition of Bayer by Elanco 8/20/2019"

"And again, I want to emphasize that as we look at this $2 billion objective, this is coming from every one of the divisions. This has got to be a broad front approach, it's going to be a broad front attack, every division has to be able to perform up to expectations. — Peter Huntsman, President & CEO, March 2014"

"We're also adjusting the timeline by which we expect to achieve our longer-term margin targets laid out at our December 2020 Investor Day.... We remain committed to 60% gross margin and 31% adjusted EBITDA margin, and we'll provide an update on timing in 2023... — CEO Jeff Simmons Q2 2022 Earnings Call 8/8/2022"

"We only recently closed on the deal and are still working to quantify the extent of these synergies. But expect there to be significant opportunities to rationalize expenses by eliminating duplicate sales efforts in combining certain aspects of our teams both of which are based in Seattle. — CFO on Q1’2018 Call"

"“Around 60-70%, disappointing from a trial inspection system. We would expect it to be 80-90%, problematic light source, uptime, and user interface not as friendly or capable as a comparable KLA system.” — Longtime executive at Global Foundries; directly involved with Lasertec and all aspects of mask inspection"

"The Board of Directors concluded that none of these candidates possess the relevant board and management experience, expertise and engagement expected of the Company's Outside Directors, and that these candidates would not contribute to the effectiveness of the Board and the enhancement of the corporate value."

"“$69.6 million was due to the increase in non-cancellable non-refundable advance consideration or cash consideration received from customers which preceded the Company's satisfaction of the associated performance obligations relating to product sales expected to be fulfilled in the next 12 months.” — SMCI 10-Q"

"We believe investors are ascribing an irrationally high valuation to Oatly. Per the Company’s own trusted data source of Euromonitor, the plant-based dairy market in its key regions is expected to be $21 billion by 2025. However, Oatly’s current valuation is almost $12 billion, or 62% of the projected market."

"“Yeah, it was definitely slowing down. The way you could gauge that would be the pressure that was applied from above, the flattening out of the trend...definitely, there was a flattening, which would be expected, but the company and the powers that be did not want to hear it.” — Ex-Harmony territory manager"

"You then said you had an investigation conducted by Ernst & Young (EY). This is the same company that prepared the annual financial statements. What did you expect? That they would come forward and say, Oops, sorry, we've made a mistake, we're returning our auditor's licence to practice? This is laughable."

"Stifel's $29 price target and "Buy" recommendation illustrates that analysts and investors are expecting expansion of the Amazon relationship. Barclays as well believes Amazon sales will be stable for the next few quarters, and acknowledges the big downside risk. We believe the market will be disappointed."

"Because we believe that IPX may be challenged to meet the revenue expectations set by analysts (and they may never produce any revenue in one possible scenario), we believe the best way to evaluate the valuation is price to book value. On this metric, IPX’s share price appears to be materially overvalued."

"By committing to purchase the Bertelsmann stake two years in the future at such a high value relative to the then-current economic performance of the business, AOL left itself exposed to both any potential shortfall in operating performance relative to such high expectations, as well as market volatility."

""Throughout the year, demand largely met or exceeded our expectations, but closed sales haven't. From 2017 to 2022, between 6.3% and 7.2% of the people who contacted Redfin or our partner agents had closed a sale with us by this point in the year. In 2023, that number is 5.5%" — Redfin Q2'23 Earnings Call"

"Volker is a private company with annual revenues of approximately $100 million in 2010. As previously disclosed, Hill-Rom anticipates the transaction will not have any impact on adjusted earnings per share in fiscal year 2012, but is expected to be accretive thereafter. — Volker Acquisition Press Release"

""I think we expect to get back in our organic core business back into the 5% to 7% growth range across both of those businesses really driven by net new sales, as Tim talked about earlier in both our capital markets business and wealth management business." — CFO Reese, Q4 2021 Conf Call, April 12, 2021"

"The fan blade, developed with Alcoa, is made of aluminium-lithium alloy and tipped with titanium on the leading edge. Efforts to speed up blade manufacturing have taken longer than expected, leaving Pratt with fewer units than it expected by now, according to people familiar with the process. — Reuters"

"They state they are “disturbed” by the “hype”; label it a “quantum Ponzi scheme” to “lure unsuspecting investors” with “fake science”; “a bubble” which may “crash” and take “legitimate” research “down with it”; “crazy headlines” and “false expectations” that are “not based on any research or reality”."

"As a result of the Mar Cor Business acquisition, the Company recorded an Earn Out asset for $7,824 which represented the fair value of amounts expected to be received back from escrow based on the forecasted achievement of certain sales performance goals at the acquisition date. — Evoqua 10-K and 10-Q"

"“I guess, so just the mine grades, we expect and it was part of the budget, we expect the mine grades to stay at around those levels for about another six weeks from now. And then we’ll return those to the Life of Mine plan, which is roughly 2 grams a ton.” — Peter Breese, AKG Q1 2017 conference call."

"For the 2020 financial year, we are planning an 8% decline in sales. The scil International Group is planning an 11% decline in sales in 2020 compared to the previous year. The reason for this is the expected discontinuation of a supplier, as he wants to sell his products directly. — Heska 2019 Report"

"Spruce Point believes that, with Penumbra U.S. Stroke revenue growth set to slow in the face of heavy competition, and with consensus peripheral thrombectomy sales expectations far too aggressive, company-wide sales growth is set to be cut almost in half from Street estimates, from FY19 through FY21."

"Spruce Point believes that, with Penumbra U.S. Stroke revenue growth set to slow in the face of heavy competition, and with consensus peripheral thrombectomy sales expectations far too aggressive, company-wide sales growth is set to be cut almost in half from Street estimates, from FY19 through FY21."

"Our YE24 remains $38, based on a sum-of-the-parts analysis. Our SOTP assumes a YE24 net contracted earning assets per share of ~$7, plus ~$30 in value per share for future deployments based on an assigned 13x multiple to expected contracted value creation in FY25 (PV7.5) less incremental financing."

"“disturbed” by the “hype”; label it a “quantum Ponzi scheme” to “lure unsuspecting investors” with “fake science”; “a bubble” which may “crash” and take “legitimate” research “down with it”; “crazy headlines” and “false expectations” that are “not based on any research or reality” — UMD Professors."

"Hill-Rom Holdings, Inc.'s ("Hill-Rom") Ba2 rating reflects the company's moderate financial leverage. The rating also reflects the risks associated with a growth strategy that is expected to rely on acquisitions, which could be debt financed and result in integration risks. — Moody's Credit Rating"

"Low compensation levels as indicated by Carvana’s filings is confirmed by employee reviews posted online: it appears that management is trying to attract talent without offering attractive compensation by creating a “fun” startup-like culture and hiring young people with low salary expectations."

"Our 2025E Low forecast assumes sustained weakness in North American new life sales, stronger than expected outflows from the UK-based adviser platform, and further challenges for the international business, which has been under pressure recently due to macro-related headwinds in China and Spain."

"We urge you to change direction and do the right thing for shareholders. As we have expressed to you, we expect the shareholders’ interest to remain of paramount importance and will look to make significant changes to the Board if you continue to make decisions that destroy shareholder value."

""I think your last question was on how we see 2016, I think I answered already what we expect to get. The message I can add to what I already said is we do not anticipate for 2016 a higher contribution of real estate development projects than in 2015." — Antoine Giscard d'Estaing - Casino CFO"

"The substantial $35.8 million gap between these positive contributors and the minimal increase in overall guidance strongly indicates that Tempus's fundamental genomics and data segments are significantly underperforming compared to expectations established just months earlier in February."

"Share price underperformance has occurred despite no significant change in the operational outlook for ArborGen or Tenon leading us to believe that the primary cause for the underperformance was the mis-management of both the ArborGen IPO and shareholder expectations with respect to Tenon."

"We believe that PSX' debt levels are already appropriate for their mix of businesses (using 3.5x for midstream, 2.5x for chems, and 1.0x for refining based on peers, we would expect a 2.5x debt/EBITDA target is appropriate which they are already below). — Bank of America, February 7, 2025"

"We believe that PSX' debt levels are already appropriate for their mix of businesses (using 3.5x for midstream, 2.5x for chems, and 1.0x for refining based on peers, we would expect a 2.5x debt/EBITDA target is appropriate which they are already below). — Bank of America, February 7, 2025"

"We believe that PSX' debt levels are already appropriate for their mix of businesses (using 3.5x for midstream, 2.5x for chems, and 1.0x for refining based on peers, we would expect a 2.5x debt/EBITDA target is appropriate which they are already below). — Bank of America, February 7, 2025"

"In short, we expect to return in cash about 59% of [the August 5, 2019] market capitalization to our shareholders while at the same time keeping an ownership in a predictable business that generates over 80% of today’s operating income. — NLOK CEO Vincent Pilette, Q1 FY2020 Earnings Call"

"We struggle to explain how gross margins expanded in the face of a structural decline of inventory turnover, and a material drop in revenues in 2015 (from emerging market challenges), and the Swiss National Bank unexpectedly changing policy in early 2015 to strengthen the Swiss Franc."

""The Commission has stated that, as a general principle, the fair value of a portfolio security is the price which the fund might reasonably expect to receive upon its current sale." — Douglas Scheidt, Associate Director and Chief Counsel in the SEC’s Division of Investment Management"

""Vishal you made one comment that I'd like to touch upon in a bit more detail relative to our past acquisitions. There's perhaps maybe one or two acquisitions I can point to that perhaps have not materialized, the benefits that we would have expected historically." — Q2 2023 Conf Call"

""Between spaces completed since 2020 and what's still in the pipeline, the [Austin] office market will grow nearly 25% – the fastest rate on the continent...Roughly 87% of new office space is expected to open vacant, according to data from Cushman & Wakefield." — Cushman & Wakefield"