Callouts & quotes from 37,061+ activist slides

""This man (Sali Berisha) has decided at the end of his term with these five concessions that we have to pay for the next 15 years. They are money that does not go to the state budget but in the pockets of the concessionaires, Sali Berisha and the ministers who signed these contracts, "he declared. — Brace"

"For the top four maize-exporting countries, which ac- count for 87% of global maize exports, the probability that they have simultaneous production losses greater than 10% in any given year is presently virtually zero, but it increases to 7% under 2 °C warming and 86% under 4 °C warming — Tigchelaar et al"

""We do not currently have a large patent portfolio, which could prevent us from deterring patent infringement claims through our own patent portfolio, and our competitors and others may now and in the future have significantly larger and more mature patent portfolios than we have." — PowerSchool FY23 10-K"

"Mr. Wu Yonghua, aged 41, is the Executive Director and the Executive Vice President of the Company. He is primarily responsible for the Group's sales and marketing management. He joined the Group in October 2003 and has over 10 years of experience in sales and marketing in China. — ANTA 2012 Annual Report"

""While the revenue came in the quarter was strong, the overall performance of the sales organization and specifically new sales activity in the second quarter was unacceptable. The management team and I have spent the past month restructuring the global sales function" — CEO Siebel (2Q'22 Conference Call)"

""Some of the costs of these promotions with celebrities are massive. And you know, any investor looking at would probably say, hey, we're not seeing the return here. And I think it's pretty justified to say that. I mean, the costs are pretty outrageous." — Spruce Point Interview With Former HIMS Executive"

""Before we even pegged the ground two years ago, me and my co-founder had the materials tested at pH4 and pH1 ... to establish whether there were any rare earths coming into solution ... We didn't want to waste any of our own money. That was a very cheap, very quick test to do." — Rick Pobjoy, AR3 Founder"

"“This is consistent with other previously documented evidence that these legacy fraud verification vendors failed to detect even the most basic forms of invalid traffic ("IVT")- e.g. a mismatch between the domain declared in the bid request and the domain on which the ad actually ran.” — Dr. Augustine Fou"

"The executive at PACCAR was certain that just from the standpoint of the actual truck – excluding any of the hardware and sensors directly related to the autonomous functionality – the autonomous-enabled trucks would be at least $50,000 more expensive to the customer, but probably more. — PACCAR Executive"

"The system is outdated and they need a lot of innovation on their workflows. That's the feedback we have gotten. But I would definitely recommend doing their due diligence and also speaking to the references, and I think that kind of sums it up. I tend to use this line quite a few times. — IQVIA executive"

"Smart devices and implants will play a big role in orthopaedics and we are excited for OrthoSensor to join Stryker as we continue to innovate and advance smart sensor technologies, including intraoperative sensors, wearables and smart implants across our joint replacement business. — Stryker (Jan 5, 2021)"

""...we've seen our market share continue to grow... given our track record of success in helping companies more efficiently manage their healthcare spend while simultaneously enhancing the patient experience through our superior clinical outcomes." — CEO Peter Anevski on PGNY Q3 2022 Earnings Call 11/3/22"

""...a growing level of excitement among our team and our board about this [PDN] opportunity. So, I would say we are, with each passing month, we get, the more psyched internally about the ability to enter this market and grow a meaningful and defensible business..." — Keith Grossman, CEO, comments 11/5/20"

""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"

"The Agency determined that HARMONY 1 could not be considered as adequate and well-controlled trial for the cataplexy endpoint for the following reasons: 1. Cataplexy was a secondary endpoint in HARMONY 1. There was no prospective plan to control the Type-I error rate for secondary endpoints in this study."

"衡器行业和工业控制领域是公司所处行业的主要下游行业，其市场较为分散，市场竞争较为激烈。激烈的市场竞争对公司的产品质量、服务、价格、研发能力和市场开拓能力等提出了更高的要求。公司与威世(Vishay)测量集团、HBM公司、梅特勒-托利多(Mettler Toledo)集团为代表的国际龙头企业相比，在研发能力、高端产品、资本实力等方面仍有一定差距。虽然公司通过加强研发投入、加强自主品牌建设、开拓下游应用领域等措施强化核心竞争力，但国际竞争对手也加快了制造重心向我国的转移，从而加大了市场竞争风险。若公司未来不能继续加强自己的竞争优势，可能在日趋激烈的市场竞争中处于不利地位，公司将面临市场竞争导致的销量下滑风险。"

"We face intense competition in each of our businesses. We participate in an intensely competitive industry with numerous global and regional competitors. Over the past few years, certain of our competitors have added oilseed processing and refining capacity in response to growing demand. — Bunge 2025 10-K"

"Last month, Danimer Scientific's own Dr. Isao Noda traveled to Dubai and attended the Global Bottled Water Congress along with existing partners Maurizio Patarnello, CEO and Chairman of Nestlé Waters, and Simon Lowden, President and Chief Marketing Officer of Global Foods at PepsiCo (pictured). — Facebook"

"Хотел бы уточнить о возможности размещения четырех детей из ДНР и ЛНР в вашем отеле 22-27 марта 2026 г. для размещения их в семьи. Милые девочки возрастом 14-17 лет. Красотки! Трое - сироты, у еще одного ребенка где-то родители на Украине. У всех удочерение — Anonymous email sender to NOVOTEL Krasnoyarsk."

"Ares Capital marked Soil Safe's equity at zero and booked a $13m “net realized gain”. This suggests the deal was close to the value of the debt's fair value. The double digit interest rates paid by Soil Safe at a time of ultra low borrowing costs illustrate that Soil Safe was a deeply distressed company."

"Using the Wayback Machine, we see that Generac's PWRcell used to directly compare itself against Tesla's Powerwall, and made claims of having the largest storage capacity. The table below was depicted on its website at least through June 2021, but was omitted in Jan 2022 according to the Wayback Machine."

"The Company raised money from GS Capital Partners in late October 2020. Don’t be fooled: Goldman Sachs isn’t headquartered in a condo townhome in Brooklyn. “GS” stands for Gabriel Sayegh, who lent money at 10% on terms that were convertible into ABML shares at steep 40-60% discounts to the trading price."

"This anomaly raises a number of questions, not least as to what is the true value of the assets? Why would MTN sell AMT 51% of the assets for just 42% of the value, it does not appear that they were desperate to do so as there would have been other bidders? Could this mean that the assets are overstated?"

"Far from being the self-appointed gold standard in safety, the Federal Railroad Administration's August 2023 safety report found that Norfolk Southern frequently did the minimum to comply with required standards, its training programs/resources were struggling and its communication and culture were poor."

"While clear aligner producers can ship anywhere, their increasingly broad distribution across the US highlights the fact that, collectively, individual labs are quickly growing capacity and achieving national scale. Even individual orthodontists with in-house printers are offering capacity at the margin."

"The structure relies on a web of “straight line / dotted line” reporting relationships that obfuscates “ownership” of decisions and reduces organizational agility, exacerbated by the fact there are three dimensions to the matrix between Category, Sales and Functions – from global, to regional, to country"

"Spruce Point believes it is time for significant change at Kratos (Nasdaq: KTOS). Based on our research suggesting abysmal financial and compliance failures leading to a recent criminal conviction of a senior Kratos Director, we are calling for the resignation of its CEO Eric Demarco and CFO Deanna Lund."

"Based on our analysis of VIE charges for services rendered, average physician hourly rates, and disclosed annual consultations, we estimate that the average physician consultation in 2022 was under five minutes, even after the introduction of mental health counseling services that generally last an hour."

"We believe that Ms. Welty’s extensive global industrial experience, including her C-suite executive leadership roles in the chemical, natural resource and energy industries, will allow Ms. Welty to provide strategic, financial and corporate governance insight, making her a valuable addition to the Board."

"Turner's affiliate efficiency(a) (affiliate revenues per primetime households delivered) is at the high end of the range amongst the peer group primarily due to TNT, which benefits from sports programming, and CNN which had a head start as the first all-news channel, but is facing increasing competition."

"We intend to vote all of our shares against the proposals related to the proposed acquisition, and, should the transaction be voted down by shareholders at the Company’s upcoming Special Meeting of Shareholders scheduled to be held on April 12, 2019, we have also nominated a slate of director candidates."

"NOVARTIS cell and gene therapy (cont’d): Came to view machine as too high-risk for operational use; other groups beyond cell and gene therapy, such as antibody discovery, evaluated the instrument and rejected it; reliability and stability issues led to machine being barely used, around 3-4 times a month."

"In two of the biggest areas of investment, Nigeria and Gabon, the World Bank offers the following statistics: the time to recover funds in Nigeria is an average of two years, with recoveries of 28 cents on the dollar; and, the time to recover funds in Gabon averages five years for 15 cents on the dollar."

"Spruce Point believes that Rollins' gross margins reporting is also opaque. Recently in 2022, the Company provided no qualitative discussion at all about factors affecting its performance. While we applaud recent efforts for more transparency, we believe gross margin discussion could be enhanced further."

"If we adjust Ströer's 2015 organic growth formula to i) eliminate the cherry picking adjustment Ströer made, ii) reverse the reclassification of public video as Digital, and iii) use the 2014 organic growth calculation methodology, then Ströer's 2015 Digital organic growth rate would have been only 2.5%."

"Assuming on a housing recovery over the next several years, we believe FBHS is worth ~$18 to $27 per share today. The midpoint valuation is $22/share today, which is up ~70% from the recent share price of $13. If the housing market never recovers, we believe FBHS is still worth nearly $14 per share today"

"Endocrinologist #4 stated that over-the-top Vykat marketing to endocrinologists is falling flat; that it’s “not worth” the price, which they’re upset about, for what at best “may be a nice adjunct for a couple of kids”; and that the Vykat rep disingenuously tried to pretend that she didn’t know the price"

"“When a company rebrands itself, it’s a chance to shake up the old ways of doing business and introduce a new approach that offers more value to its customers. Unfortunately, Nuvei seems to have missed this opportunity entirely with the switch from the Pivotal Payments brand name.” — Merchantmaverick.com"

"Mr Vogel's LinkedIn profile describes himself as an "entrepreneur" with "18 years' of his career working in the construction industry on multi-billion-dollar infrastructure projects for multinational top-tier contractors located both in Australia and the Pacific region." — Spruce Point Capital Management"

""~11% revenue growth in FY’21, while almost the entirety of the software space is parading the past year as the year of digital transformation acceleration, has left BOX shares at a standstill and is head-scratching as the pandemic should logically be a major tailwind for BOX." — Craig-Hallum, March 2021"

""And I think Tom, it's probably worth mentioning, too, we've been public now for just over 5 years. And each of those 5 years, the unit economics of the new stores have gotten better. And the class of '20 and class of 2021 are the best class of stores we've ever opened." — CFO Lang, GS Conf. Sept 8, 2022"

"We have made significant investments in our associate training and wages over the past few years leading to improved customer service, an essential attribute in this challenging period. We are not playing catch-up with associate wages and are pleased these investments are paying off. — CFO Q1'23 May 2023"

"This [recent cost cutting] move is part of a larger effort to simplify our management structure, speed decision making and reduce costs. We are reallocating our workload and assets in order to invest in areas of higher growth, including online and new launches. — Ann Moore, Chairman and CEO of Publishing"

"DuPont’s inability to deliver on Kullman’s agenda suggests that she needs more help to overcome the 100+ years of history and the inertia that comes with that; Trian can be Kullman’s best ally. For shareowners, Trian’s impact is already very clear. — CLSA “4Q14: Just the outlook” analyst report on DuPont"

"Second, we had favorability of approximately $7 million or $0.02 in relation to reducing the earn out for our Passport acquisition within our SPD business. We are still happy with our entry into the food-safety business and the diversification that it offers our SPD division — CEO Q2 2019 Conference Call"

"Our U.S. Trauma and Extremities business grew 6.7% on a comparable basis with strong growth in our plating products combined with double-digit growth in our upper extremities business. Spine declined 6.6% organically in the U.S., primarily resulting from COVID disruptions to their business. — Stryker CFO"

""Reduce the causes of climate change and support the transition to a low carbon economy by encouraging and enabling the use of low and zero carbon technologies, supporting the development of appropriate renewable energy sources and sustainable and active transport" — County Durham Plan (CDP) Objective 17"

"In Beijing and Shanghai, where Lianjia has established significant market penetration, Lianjia is currently the only real estate brokerage brand with presence on Beike platform to guarantee high-quality customer services and strengthen market-leading positions in these two markets. — BEKE 2020 20-F, p.60"

"Their thinking wasn’t, ‘How do we innovate?’. It was, ‘How do we continue to cut this to the bone so we can sell it for as much as possible?’... ‘How do we play the game of just having enough resources to keep the lights on?’ The hope was, there was going to be one more [flip].” — Former MPLN Executive A"

"IDEMIA, a French security firm, signed a $128m contract with the TSA in 2023 to develop and install CAT-2 facial recognition technology. Today, CAT-2 machines are located in 84 airports nationwide, and will expand to the more than 400 federalized airports over the coming years. — IDEMIA contract with TSA"

"I was a bit shocked at a 5lb gain! — Patient/Caregiver in Vykat discussion group. "even on a lower dose and Lasix she still seemed to have some fluid retention...[she] has been pretty vocal about wanting to stop the Vykat because the swelling hurt her legs." — Patient/Caregiver in Vykat discussion group."

"“there were other sales directors like that, too, absolutely...what would happen is their sales reps would push back, and they would just move that sales rep to somewhere else. I'm not kidding. I saw that happen twice because of what they were doing.” — Ex-field reimbursement manager working with Harmony"

"The design studio represents a test for us, where we will see an opportunity to increase our market share in densely populated, higher-income areas, where we're not able to fit a large-format store. Our research tells us that these are mostly new, untapped customers. — Floor & Decor Q4 2019 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"

"John Hughes has multiple LinkedIn profiles. Hughes appeared as part of the Pivotal Payments management team up until March 2019 as SVP, Strategic Accounts Group. His biography says he was CEO/Co-Founder of Base Commerce. We find it unusual that he was no longer a part of the top management team pre-IPO."

"At an average sensor and transmitter revenue per patient per day of $2.00 – close to the Libre’s current level of $2.04 – Abbott would realize a gross margin of 59% on the Libre 2 (vs. our estimate of 60% today), while Dexcom would realize a gross margin of -7% on the G6 (vs. our estimate of 70% today)."

"Poor Controls over Equity Grants: That the board did not become aware until several years after the fact that multiple grants to the CEO were in violation of the Company's incentive plans indicates that it did not have adequate controls in place to monitor the Company's executive compensation practices."

"MAXR appears “cheap” on its inflated Non-IFRS metrics. However, Spruce Point’s forensic analysis unravels its aggressive accounting methods used to inflate EBITDA and EPS. Furthermore, when its debt is adjusted for standard credit agency adjustments, we find leverage to be in excess of its 5.8x covenant"

"SMCI is currently trading at the highest revenue multiple in its sector, likely a reflection of investors perception that it is growing revenues the fastest. However, unlike its peers which have historically solid free cash flow generation, SMCI has not demonstrated any long-term free cash flow ability."

"These discrepancies indicate that at best the auditor has not checked the relationship between this subsidiary and Beijing Momo. At worst, it is further evidence that the murky undisclosed relationship between Momo and agents may well be used for transactions other than the claimed broadcaster activity."