Callouts & quotes from 392+ activist slides

"In addition, HARMONY 1-bis displays all the other red flags as HARMONY 1: questionable foreign jurisdictions, with 40% of trial patients in Hungary and Argentina; pitolisant patients continued taking concomitant narcolepsy medications, creating a confounding factor; dose response data is again withheld, even though dosing was all over the place with 24% of patients on 10mg and 63% on 20mg; protocol violations and amendments, such as what appears to be another trial-size expansion, which the EMA review alludes to with no detail."

"We presume this has the obvious and intended effect: reps proliferate bogus referral forms, particularly the top performers, according to ex-employees, with one stating a current territory manager "just [told] me yesterday that...he still does it": "if you had a buddy, a doctor and say, hey listen, submit the form and then just ghost them...just submit the form and don't even worry about...the insurance information...I'll get paid for it...some representatives did that frequently.""

"By carefully analyzing Generac’s own data and assumptions, we see that penetration of portable and home standby generators has severely lagged the penetration of its reference categories while median home values and incomes have increased. Yet, Generac is claiming that the market opportunity for its product keeps expanding from $2 to $3 billion for each 1% penetration, but is narrowing its buyer demographic by now focusing on buyers aged 60 or older vs. 50 or older."

"…with Marcato establishing a 6% position in the stock, we think it is likely that 1) management will be under pressure to realize a more meaningful portion of the cost savings to EPS versus potential reinvestment 2) initiates a dialogue around the strategic value of DECK's non-core brands in its portfolio including potential alternatives 3) creates a greater sense of urgency around shareholder value enhancing initiatives including accelerated share repurchases."

"The ex-Nevro district manager’s comments reveal the severity of what we believe the company has covered up: that “sort of every KOL was saying the device isn’t working”; that sales reps across the country came to the same conclusion; the company refused to acknowledge the situation and blamed the reps instead; and that he personally couldn’t look customers “in the eye and ask them for visits anymore, because I didn’t believe in the therapy.”"

"After observing problematic restructuring accounting adjustments and financial presentation methods that we believe artificially boost Adjusted EPS and Free Cash Flow (two of the three key components of management Annual Incentive Plan), we observe that Avery Amended and Restated the Annual Incentive Plan on Jan 1, 2020 to greatly expand language around the clawback provision for fraud or intentional misconduct."

"The difference between Arconic and PCC has always been one of culture. PCC is relentless at operating the plants effectively and incentivizing its boots on the ground to drive efficiency. PCC is flat, tough, and hungry. Arconic (Alcoa EPS) has been plagued by bureaucracy and a fundamental disregard for the plant workers. That has to change not only for the Company to succeed, but for the Company to survive."

"A former BLI scientist provided extensive color on the Beacon’s instability and reliability issues: “not robust enough to ensure good results”; troubleshooting was difficult; instrument requires an overwhelming amount of training, support, and documentation and customer still couldn’t get it to work; product has too many steps to get it to run properly, requiring handholding by members of BLI’s R&D staff."

"The fiscal 2019 Cintas EPS used in the incentive plan calculations was $7.60. This EPS figure differs from the Company's reported diluted EPS from continuing operations because it takes into consideration various one-time, extraordinary financial impacts that occurred during the fiscal year, which consisted of acquisition-related integration expenses and a gain on the sale of an equity method investment."

"The video itself shows a group of prepubescent girls in fashionable bikinis in a luxury spa. While the 14-seconds clip does not reveal any criminal activity and the connection to Kappy seems mostly inferred from the timing of publication, we find it noteworthy that, as Daniel points out, the location of the scene seems to be identical with Epstein’s masseuse training location at Rixos Antalya, Turkey."

"Another ex-manufacturing employee stated that Twist’s workflow is just “standard molecular biology” steps, and that the chip in fact creates time-consuming bottlenecks such as the need for amplification, as the chip can only product negligible amounts of DNA material, which has to then be scaled 1000x with lab personnel performing a dizzying array of repetitive manuals tasks over 16 hours."

"If you multiply the company's $1.1bn of unallocated corporate costs (which would be eliminated if the businesses were separated) by 11x (PepsiCo's multiple of enterprise value / 2014 earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation and amortization (EBITDA)), it costs shareholders $12bn of value, or $8 per share, to have beverages and snacks together in a holding company structure."

"Our interactions with a significant quorum of other shareholders holding BHP shares worth tens of billions of US$ have revealed extremely broad and deep-rooted support for pro-active steps to be taken by management to achieve an optimal value outcome for BHP’s petroleum business following an in-depth, open and timely independent review, with full disclosure of the review results"

"If we adjust Amdocs' EPS for its percentage-of-completion items and 75% of newly-capitalized software, on the assumption that 75% of the change in the unamortized software account represents capitalized costs – we observe that Amdocs EPS could have been overstated by up to 15% if the observed percentage-of-completion items represent improperly pulled-forward sales."

"A former employee described concerns about WTRG's ability to meet its long-term goals leading up to the Peoples transaction. By looking carefully at the three-year period leading up to the transaction announcement in 2018, we find evidence that water revenue per customer was declining in two of three segments, while return on equity and EPS were also falling."

"As shown in our presentation, the upside from a more focused, streamlined PepsiCo is substantial – greater strategic focus, faster organic growth and meaningful profit-margin expansion would warrant a valuation in line with peers, the market and PepsiCo’s own history, representing a path to more than 50% stock-price increase from today’s depressed levels."

"It's just been very frustrating watching them not just take... like look at Wise and look at Remitly. They both started at the same place. 50% of Wise customers use more than one product and the velocity with which they put out new features, and they're just evolving very rapidly. Whereas Remitly keeps incrementally changing the things that are working."

"Once again, we urge Glencore’s Board of Directors to take all the necessary steps to (1) separate the thermal coal business, in order to accelerate Glencore’s repositioning as a leading pure player in metals, which are at the very core of the green economy transition, and (2) undertake a review of the strategic options for Glencore’s holding in Viterra."

"We believe the Street has failed to critically assess the quality and performance of Mettler’s China business, and takes management’s Adj. EPS as given, without stress testing its accounting choices that are geared towards high capitalization of development costs, endless restructuring, and long periods of amortization in excess of industry norms."

"We believe the Street has failed to critically assess the quality and performance of Mettler’s China business, and takes management’s Adj. EPS as given, without stress testing its accounting choices that are geared towards high capitalization of development costs, endless restructuring, and long periods of amortization in excess of industry norms."

"Note that Nevro can only sell a permanent implant if the patient achieved 50% pain relief during the temporary trial period that lasts a few days, creating a powerful incentive for sales reps to bulldoze the patient into uttering the magic phrase, and creating a patient base in whom the device never worked and will eventually need to be explanted."

"PepsiCo is undoubtedly one of the world's great consumer franchises, whose leading scale and iconic brands have propelled it to over 100 years of exceptional performance. Yet, the Company's strategic and financial challenges have recently led to poor operational results, sharp stock-price underperformance and a meaningfully discounted valuation."

"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."

"Conclusion: CSF histamine and tele-methylhistamine did not significantly differ between patients with narcolepsy-cataplexy and other etiologies of non-hypocretin-1 deficient central hypersomnias; these measurements, therefore, are not useful in assessing the etiology or severity of centrally mediated hypersomnia."

"We estimate gross profit per system will continue to drop as the solar investment tax credit steps down over the next 2 years. Lower margins and a reduced benefit for tax equity investors look to pressure an industry which already has tight margins and relies on tax equity to support their negative cash flows."

"Wall Street is fixated on Kratos's earnings "potential" of >100% growth in the next few years and give KTOS a commanding 20x and 70x EBITDA and P/E ratio. Be warned: this growth is off a low EPS base, on highly adjusted figures, and will surely disappoint given Kratos demonstrated ability to poorly execute."

"Spruce Point finds that, taken together, management’s consistent under-reserving has created $55M in paper earnings since FY15, accounting for 6% of cumulative EPS over the same timespan. Reversing each of these items to their FY15 levels would result in management wiping out over 16% of consensus FY19 EPS."

"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"

"But don't worry, the underwriters who have promoted GFL’s stock to investors have “reputational risk” committees which vet clients. In the case of Goldman Sachs, did that stop them from funding 1MDB and Jho Low? And Did J.P. Morgan’s risk committee weigh in on dealing with sex offender Jeffery Epstein?"

"From the end of 2013 to the end of 2016, Arconic invested $5 billion dollars in growth capital expenditures, research and development and acquisitions in EPS. For the $5 billion invested, Arconic generated an incremental $73 million of NOPAT for a Return on Incremental Invested Capital of 1.5%"

"After missing consensus EPS for 6 straight quarters, a string of exploration failures, and substantial capex overruns, John Hess announces that the Company is in midst of transformation that started in 2009 (later revised to 2010 start). This is company's 7th restructuring under current CEO."

"TASK is trying to sell investors on COVID-19 related expenses as adjustments to EBITDA and EPS. This might be perfectly acceptable if it were common practice for public company peers to do so. However, we don't believe that to be the case. As a result, we adjust TASK's EBITDA lower by ~$8m."

"We particularly note the role of reps and the central team in managing side effects such as “over-stimulation” - given the complex and multi-factorial nature of pain management, we question how reps are making clinical diagnoses of “over-stimulation” and determining its cause and treatment."

"Pershing Square believes, based on our investigation, that in the past Herbalife's compliance department made essentially no effort to enforce or audit compliance with the 70% Rule or the Ten Customer Rule and has taken steps to make Herbalife's return policy unattractive to distributors."

"He began by estimating that more than 40% of prescriptions were off-label and stated that the entire strategy was to push for off-label sleepiness in the absence of cataplexy; to misrepresent other drugs patients had to fail first; and that reps were incentivized to engage in the conduct."

"We intend to vote “AGAINST” George S. Mayes, Jr., Javier Polit and Laurie A. Tucker at the 2025 Annual Meeting to hold them accountable for their missteps and to send a message to the Board that shareholders will not tolerate more episodes of avoidable value destruction at Forward Air."

"Arconic is a tremendous platform for growth. It is not very often that a potential growth platform goes underutilized like Arconic has. I see a huge opportunity for accretive M&A in the EPS business, however, before those deals can be pursued, Arconic has to get its house in order."

"If Val-gan can grow organically at a high single-digit rate as Valeant management projects, and management can invest the company’s free cash flow in new acquisition targets at historical rates of return, then we believe management can achieve its goal of 15%-20% annual EPS growth"

"It appears that Saputo keeps flip-flopping its reporting of Total waste and Total food waste. Optically, Saputo now reports significantly lower overall waste. However, it did not change its definition for Total food waste in its reporting section. Total waste now excludes sludge."

"Our interactions with a significant quorum of other shareholders holding BHP shares worth tens of billions of US$ have revealed extremely broad and deep-rooted support for pro-active steps to be taken by management to achieve an optimal value outcome for BHP's petroleum business."

"For private entities, the central legal question would generally be whether they knew or should have known that their services were being used in connection with such conduct and whether they nonetheless provided material assistance or failed to take reasonable preventive steps."

"While unfortunate, this disappointing trajectory has created a historic opportunity: With the right mindset and an appropriately ambitious turnaround plan, PepsiCo today represents a rare chance to revitalize a leading global enterprise and unlock significant shareholder value."

"The plan that will be implemented with the election of all seven of our nominees and appointment of our proposed management team is projected to grow EPS from $11.81 (as of 2023) to $21.00 (as of month 36) to ~$23.00 (by FY 2027), a 93.7% earnings increase in just four years."

"Our EPS/EBITDA estimates for 2017/2018 are ~3%/-10% below Street consensus. We expect strong top-line growth from North American onshore activity levels (~30%-35% of current revenues), but this will be partially offset by headwinds from offshore activity (~40% of revenues)."

"In our opinion, MAXR’s 2018 Adj. EPS expectation of $4.75/sh is pure fiction. The Company has made numerous aggressive accounting choices that inflate its Non-IFRS results. Based on our forensic review, we estimate EBITDA and EPS are overstated by 17% and 79%, respectively"

"The sell side values VRNT on a P/E basis against Non-GAAP EPS. This approach fails to take into account Verint's poor organic growth, the widening disparity between GAAP EPS and (low-quality) Non-GAAP EPS, and the Company's failure to grow cash flow despite a flood of M&A."

"We have issues with TeliaSonera’s continuation of two previous accounting gimmicks that in 2013 and 2014 (the two years for which this board is responsible for the financials) respectively inflated reported EPS by SEK0.19 per share and SEK0.12 per share, or 5.9% and 3.8%."

"We believe 2015 EPS will likely be between $2.60 to $3.20. At a 13x P/E, the total value per share at year end 2014 is $36 to $43. If same-store sales remain flat for the next several years, year end 2014 total value per share is $28, driven largely by share repurchases"

"Avery is more expensive and levered than it appears. We believe Avery inflates Adjusted EBITDA and EPS with dubious restructuring add-backs. In addition, it obscures reporting of operating leases, which are also debt, and ignores pension and environmental liabilities."

"After years of Phillips 66’s (NYSE: PSX) stock underperformance and operational missteps, the investor community is fed up with its strategy and leadership – even as it gives high marks to the Company’s collection of strong assets and enviable competitive positioning."

"It was a huge red flag...quite a lot of these prescriptions were junk...they were just bullshit...I mean, they were for the wrong indication...not even narcolepsy, not even cataplexy...they were like for sleeping disorders – a sleeping disorder is not narcolepsy, ok?."

"After years of Phillips 66's (NYSE: PS) stock underperformance and operational missteps, the investor community is fed up with its strategy and leadership - even as it gives high marks to the Company's collection of strong assets and enviable competitive positioning."

"After years of Phillips 66’s (NYSE: PS) stock underperformance and operational missteps, the investor community is fed up with its strategy and leadership – even as it gives high marks to the Company’s collection of strong assets and enviable competitive positioning."

"We believe this is truly a unique opportunity to unlock significant value in Hyundai Motor Group by taking the necessary steps to realign its equity value with the top-class business that the Founding Family and the leadership of the Group have built over the decades"

"MSCI's leverage ratio keeps rising and is at a decade high which significantly increases the risk to equity holders. At the current time, we believe it is a recipe for disaster that leverage is rising while client Retention Rate falls and competitive risks increase."

""Just So Happens" Mettler increased its EUR/CHF hedge for the first time ever ahead of the unexpected Swiss Franc revaluation. Thereafter, an audit committee member resigned, borrowing increased, and Mettler's EPS and guidance beat the Street on subsequent quarters."

"Trian Consumer Investments where Nelson Peltz served on the Board have: 1) Grown earnings per share (“EPS”) +780 basis points (“bps”) faster than the S&P 500 annually; and 2) Achieved total shareholder returns (“TSR”) of +880bps greater than the S&P 500 annually"

"A fourth KOL - a current Nevro consultant, recipient of significant payments from the company, and one of their highest volume KOL's - was nonetheless candid about reps being "an extension of your practice" and "steering" and "pushing" patients into stimulators."

"Trian believes the mindset and culture at State Street has prioritized growth (in AUCA, AUM and revenue) over profitability. The “land grab” mentality must transition to a focus on EPS growth, return on invested capital and maximizing total shareholder returns"

"Despite owning 65% and controlling the majority of DTA's operating capacity, AMR claims it doesn't control the asset because "two reps must be present for business to be conducted and unanimous approval of both parities is needed for decisions to be taken"."