Callouts & quotes from 37,061+ activist slides

"The concerns are detailed in the report we received, which include: 1) a failure to correct the H3 receptor antagonist radioligand (the foundation of the study) for metabolism, which artificially inflates the results; 2) troubling patterns in the data that "call into question the accuracy of the information presented in the PET study.""

"“...we've maintained margins in the 75% to 80% range over time and we expect the long-term margins to stay in that 75% to 80% range.” — CFO Dylan Smith, August 2015; “...75% to 80% long-term range, which is still our current view in terms of the steady state and long-term gross margins of the business.” — CFO Dylan Smith, December 2015"

"[...] the Board regularly reviews its leadership structure and considers this to be a key component of fulfilling its fiduciary duties to our shareholders. Importantly, the Board has chosen to maintain flexibility in its leadership structure and has not mandated the separation of the Chairman and CEO roles — BlackRock Proxy Filing 2024"

"“We finally received a little peek into the future of Disney’s streaming plan as the company shared a target of double-digit profit margins in streaming. As new CFO Hugh Johnston rightly admitted, that target should have been obvious, however, the timing and path forward still remain pretty ambiguous.” — MoffettNathanson, February 2024"

"results from sites in Russia...cannot be trusted — Study of foreign trials cited in Petitioner's report. "disturbing and it's good to get it published...offshoring for financial reasons is bad because it raises risk of malfeasance." — FDA Commissioner Robert Califf. "The primary EDS endpoint, the Epworth Sleepiness Scale" — FDA review."

"“The proposed spin-off of Aabaco Holdings, Inc. ("Aabaco Holdings") is not Yahoo's best alternative. Instead, you should be exploring a sale of Yahoo's core Search and Display advertising businesses ("Core Business") and leave Yahoo's ownership stakes in Alibaba Group and Yahoo Japan in the existing corporate entity.” — Starboard Value"

"[...] the Board regularly reviews its leadership structure and considers this to be a key component of fulfilling its fiduciary duties to our shareholders. Importantly, the Board has chosen to maintain flexibility in its leadership structure and has not mandated the separation of the Chairman and CEO roles — BlackRock Proxy Filing 2024"

"“Much of the rest of biology is conducted on plastic, which its not necessarily natural, but all of our expertise was developed on these plastic plates and dishes. It makes sense when you move over to silicon; there's going to be a lot of unnatural things that are going to happen as well” — Leading academic institution/ex-BLI scientist"

"“We finally received a little peek into the future of Disney’s streaming plan as the company shared a target of double-digit profit margins in streaming. As new CFO Hugh Johnston rightly admitted, that target should have been obvious, however, the timing and path forward still remain pretty ambiguous.” — MoffettNathanson, February 2024"

"“The Paragonix devices are changing the whole - I was in the operating room the other day - Mass General, was getting lungs from California, in a Paragonix. And typically, that would have only been TransMedics a couple of years ago. but they’re changing the game.” — Organ procurement specialist at a Northwest academic transplant center"

"I’d figured I’d start my presentation off with a little math formula… And it’s basically the formula for how AOL returns to overall growth. And basically that happens… when the absolute dollar growth from all the growth businesses… exceeds the decline of the subscription and search operations. — CFO Arthur Minson, Investor Day, 6/16/11"

"“We have this going on now”; “we are on week 5...she had some edema too...did your kiddo have swelling as well?”; “each time the dose goes up she has swelling worse”; “water’s heavy...that is a lot...a gallon of water is roughly 8 lbs so 5 lbs would be more than half a gallon of retained fluids....” — Parents in Vykat discussion groups"

"“There were three main side effects which not everybody gets. I want to say about 15% may have had the side effect of edema and maybe 20% the side effect of hyperglycemia and maybe 20% the side effect of hypertrichosis. There certainly was potential for unblinding. No question..” — Trial investigator, pediatrician/geneticist, professor"

"“The frictional costs and operational risks, including tax implications, of executing Pershing Square's ideas” — Target Management; “The risk of diverting management's focus away from core business operations over an extended time period to execute such a complex transaction, particularly in the current environment” — Target Management"

"Spruce Point finds that Generac’s subsidiary disclosed receiving €500,000 for a sponsorship from “a company with an 50% indirect interest” and that it is owed money. We know that Alma Group was a key sponsor. Did it also have an indirect interest in Generac’s subsidiary? Generac should disclose who is the mysterious indirect interest?"

"Based on a survey conducted by the Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario ("FSRA"), 62% of WFG agents reviewed were cited for contraventions of the insurance act with the most common contravention being a lack of disclosure on which insurers the agent were representing and insufficient disclosures on conflicts of interest."

"Given what we believe to be management and the Board's history of questionable decision making, how can shareholders trust the Company to rush this critical decision when management repeatedly refuses to share one of the most important assumption affecting the value that shareholders should expect to receive in a Red Lobster spin-off?"

"Looking carefully, we see that in 2020 BR bracketed “Client Platform Spend” with Capex. Moving forward, it changed its presentation to “Client Investment Spend” and then “Client Platform Investments”. BR provides limited context on these figures and spending but we can safely assume this $902 million of total costs are related to UBS."

"Bristol Meyers Squibb employee #1, a group leader: We began working with BLI years ago and have about 5 machines; still “not operational,” just “tinkering” and testing; implies it was a waste as big pharma companies tend to “blow a lot of money” on new technology; Bristol prefers to stick with cheaper, conventional cytometry machines."

"Despite Heska’s efforts to paint a picture of a transformed company, we believe the evidence (including SEC filings, supplier contracts, legal discovery, reported financials, R&D spend, capital investment, business practices, and actual product shipping in the market) indicates that Heska’s business has changed very little, if at all."

"In addition, our Trustpilot scores are the highest among money transfer service companies in the U.S. and among the best in other regions. We are committed to simply being the best provider in every corridor we serve and continuously improving in every aspect so we can deliver on promises, win trust and grow. — CEO on Trustpilot Q3'23"

"“Ultimately, I think the relationship got much better with the manufacturers that stayed with ATD. They saw blood in the water when Goodyear and Bridgestone dropped ATD and went out of their way to lower price or give us more incentive to replace that business with their brands.” — Former TireHub employee, Public Interview, March 2023"

"Moreover, we find that the compensation provided by Elliott to their nominees is consistent and comparable to that of the company's continuing directors; specifically, continuing directors have similar upside potential on historical share grants received during their tenure as directors. — David H. Batchelder, Relational Investors LLC"

"“The company stuck with inexpensive reality TV productions after their novelty began to wear off. Viacom ‘built franchises that lasted a decade — such as SpongeBob, Dora The Explorer and Jon Stewart — but hasn’t reinvested for the 21st century,’ says one executive who knows the company well. ‘It’s jaw-dropping.’” — Anonymous executive"

""So it's not that we are not looking at the utilization of 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 cost." — Dr. Klaus Kleinfeld, November 4, 2014"

""We have implemented a zero-based budgeting process by brand with a sophisticated ROI analysis looking at every single piece of our marketing mix to ensure we are spending money only where we are getting the best returns." — Tony Hooper, EVP of Global Commercial Operations at Amgen, Amgen 2014 Business Review Meeting, October 28, 2014"

"No. So not, other clients, okay, you know, like a medium size, like a small size, you know, clients, they prefer us to be a DDP, because for the big brands, they always have their own, you know, logistic, you know, key, handle everything. Sometimes I think they even sign the fixed rate contract with the steamboat carrier. — Supplier B"

"I think in 2024 they really started to feel the impact of the competitive landscape... Celsius and Alani and you had GHOST and then you even had these brands that would come and go like Prime Energy that would come in and kind of steal the noise... Celsius has really taken a big dip into the Monster business. — Former Monster Employee"

"“…I feel great about where we are with the studio. Let’s not lose sight of the fact that in the last year, the studio had some real success, not to suggest that we didn’t have some films that were not successful that we were really disappointed in, but we also had some great success too.” — Robert A. Iger, CEO & Director, January 2024"

"I was once previously an agent with WFG. I left and terminated my advisor code with them june or july 2023... I have acquired $600 worth of debt with them because of it. I was also never contacted by WFG to tell me i have debt, I found out 8 months later and it has ruined my credit score. — Excerpt Of FTC Complaint Submitted 4/23/2024"

"Henry Fernandez, our lead independent director, is a director and Chairman of the Board of MSCI. In April 2021, we entered into a cooperation agreement with MSCI, pursuant to which we will assist MSCI in MSCI's construction of life sciences index products in exchange for a share of MSCI's revenues from those products. — Royalty Pharma"

"“I would take it all with a huge grain of salt...the reason their data looks better is because they're paying for it...So all of those metrics are all gonna look better, but not because of anything special about Progeny, It's somewhat of an artifact of their model.” — Endocrinologist at Leading Fertility Clinic, Spruce Point Interview"

""Now the team at Bemis and Amcor have worked together to identify and evaluate the cost synergies related to this combination and on slide 14 we've laid out some of the details related to those synergies. Based on this work together we're confident in being able to generate $180 million in cost synergies." — CEO Ron Delia, Aug 6, 2018"

"As of December 31, 2021, our headquarters and principal executive offices are located at 65 East 55th Street, 17th Floor, New York, New York 10022, consisting of approximately 34,825 square feet, under a lease which expires in June 2030, unless terminated earlier under certain circumstances specified in our leases. — CLEAR SEC Filings"

"“The hair thing is really difficult and same with the edema because you can't control for that. And you can't obviously give a placebo that would potentially make them have increased hair growth. It's difficult with this kind of study because you'll never be able to blind that properly.” — Trial investigator, pediatric endocrinologist"

""Systems. Implementing a system of Salesforce took us four attempts. It was really complicated with all the resellers and all the different ways our different products are sold. And we bought two companies, so how do we integrate licenses for all those things in Salesforce? We spent a ton of money and failed many times." — Dax Dasilva"

"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. — Kao Board of Directors"

"“The way that they set it up, it is cheaper for me to ask a TransMedics surgeon to go and recover the liver than sending my own surgeon. I have to pay for two transportations...basically, they are forcing you to do it...if I send my own surgeon, it’s going to cost me more money.” — Transplant surgeon in a leadership role at Vanderbilt"

"We’re honored to be selected for Stage B of DARPA’s Quantum Benchmarking Initiative. With commercial deployments of IonQ quantum systems worldwide – and availability on all three of the major cloud platforms – IonQ is uniquely positioned to contribute practical insights and technical advancements to this initiative. — IonQ CEO de Masi"

"A. 15% is about accurate. Our panel covers about 85% of organisms. Our panel does not cover 100% of bug/antibiotic combinations, so you still need cell culture. It is not easy to cover 100%, because we use FISH probes and they may not be available for some bugs. Because of the FISH method we are somewhat limited. — AXDX Representative"

"FIGS points to its design innovation, such as bringing the 'jogger' pant style (which has existed for years in the realm of athletic wear), to the scrubs market. We do not believe such design introductions to provide a sustainable advantage. Searching for jogger pants on Uniform Advantage yields 113 options in a vast array of colors."

"What makes WTRG’s Board believe that the CEO of Lancaster Colony (a food company) is an “Audit Committee Financial Expert”? Examining his work experience dating back to 2002 shows that he held predominately food marketing roles and we find no evidence he has served on any other public company audit committee before this current role."

"In contrast to the CEO’s claim that “VW has gone all in,” VW comments strike us as ambivalent and noncommittal at best - indicating any orders/commitments would be a decade away; that they’re evaluating other solid-state players; and that it’s unclear who they’ll select, assuming that hurdles to solid-state batteries can be overcome."

"Documents from a class action shareholder lawsuit against Lumenis Ltd. allege that its predecessor ESC Medical Systems (where CEO Gerstel was VP Operations/COO) was, "a company fraught with problems, among other things poor product reliability, physician lawsuits, increasing inventories, and poor collections of accounts receivables.""

"We estimate that, at best, EPS would have been flat or modestly down without Cintas’ crafty financial and accounting gamesmanship that involved lowering its tax rate, redirecting capital towards share repurchases despite repeatedly saying it was the lowest capital priority, and lowering amortization expense for G&K service contracts."

"pitolisant is a “potent inhibitor of CYP2D6 and hERG”; “our laboratory findings suggest that CYP2D6 inhibition...would likely be important hurdles for this novel compound”; and that “in vitro profiling in our laboratory (and others) suggests that BF2.639 [pitolisant] has both a CYP2D6 liability...and potent hERG channel K+ blockade.”"

""although it pains me to say it, it's not about the patient, it's about the doctor and what pays the most. And the bottom line is for office-based procedures [such as MISTs] the doctor earns much more and they're pushed by Medicare and insurance because they cost less." — Spruce Point Interview with Major Hospital Urologist, Nov 2024"

""In the last [few] years, we have really been aligning the whole company very strongly behind our agenda, which is nutrition, health and wellness..." — Paul Bulcke, CEO, Sept 2012; "Big trend, health and wellness – this is no longer a trend or a fad. This is here to stay. Profound changes are underway..." — Indra Nooyi, CEO, Feb 2011"

""I just felt that they are not ethical. So, that's just me personally. My whole working career is always based on trust and if the customer doesn't trust me, I don't really understand how I'm ever going to get anything accomplished. MPS continually violated that trust between the customer and me." — Former MPS Sales Account Executive"

""Although the specific findings and conclusions of the Committee, as advised by its legal and forensic accounting professionals, remain privileged, the Company announced that the Committee has informed it that the Committee is satisfied that the vast majority of the short sellers' claims were baseless." — China Integrated Energy Inc."

""Pure is completely wrong there. Amazon makes a fortune on S3, which is still HDD-based. That's gonna be the case for a while because there's this thing called cold data. Why would I ever put cold data on an all-flash array? I will never do that. I would get fired if I made that recommendation." — Former data storage architect at AWS"

""This error is the result of applying an incorrect standard cost to intercompany K-Cup inventory balances in consolidation. This error resulted in an overstatement of the consolidated inventory and an understatement of the cost of sales." — Green Mountain Coffee Roasters, Inc. Announces Restatement of Financials, Nov 19, 2021 and 8-K"

"Overall, a strong culture of fear. The culture and company practices promote individual, rather than team, achievement, motivating selfish choices and combative relationships between coworkers. Public shaming is common practice, and team leadership turns a blind eye to disrespectful behavior between colleagues. — Glassdoor.com review"

"Northeastern [University] has this co-op program where they’ll allow you to work at a company for a few semesters. The hardware team was mostly composed of co-ops... You would think hardware was the lifeblood of XL, but it was them figuring out what the constraints were and then ordering off-the-shelf hardware. — Former XL Employee D"

"“Overstock sells lots of products today where installation and assembly make complete sense from a customer perspective that they should be included,” said Matt Ehrlichman, CEO of Porch.com. Customers expect installation services for everything from furniture to light fixtures, all of which are sold on Overstock’s online marketplace."

"Each inspector was paying probably anywhere from a $1 to $3 per inspection to use that software. So if you knew your average lead was worth $14 - $15 bucks you could easily give that product away, and lower your cost of acquisition. I'm quoting the bigger customers too, the larger the volume the lower the fees — Former Porch Employee"

"Maybe soon there will be talk about decent advertising campaigns modulating across three screens - cross-device[s] - namely via mobile devices, through home screens, but also through public screens. We have established ourselves in this part of the market over a very long period and we are now trying to digitize it further. — C. Sch."

""For the long term, we expect the company to grow sales at 7% and earnings at 12% compounded annually. These performance goals reflect the diversity of our portfolio, attractive returns on growth investments, such as research and development and capital expenditures, plus benefits from ongoing productivity." — DuPont's CEO (12/13/11)"

"“The atmosphere at the company was very much to downplay the adverse effects [...] if you were to follow up with the company, I would really press on what were the hospitalizations of patients in the trials? And to just ignore the causality and just look at what the cause –” — Ex-Soleno employee #1, key role in clinical trial program"

""they [PCS] don't have any standing authority to designate one event versus another unless it's something in their contract says that's the case, but that would be unusual." — Reinsurance expert; "many of the homes [destroyed] are bespoke and high value, so it will take extra effort to understand designs and replacement costs." — BMS"