Other comments already explained what an activist investor is.  It is adversarial...but that is the price to pay if you want to be a public company.  If a company wants to raise capital from the public, they then need to deal with shareholders, especially large shareholders&#x27; wishes.  If they dont want that type of noise, they can stay private.<p>The activist investor wants what is best for the stock, so it is not necessarily bad.  It can be bad though if they only want a short-term pop in the stock, instead of a longer term growth plan.