By Svea Herbst-Bayliss

NEW YORK(Reuters) -Activist investors who push companies for operational changes and management shake-ups waged fewer campaigns during the first half of 2025 as tariffs, wars and U.S. President Donald Trump's unpredictable policies made them more cautious, new data show.

The pace of investor demands, aimed at pushing up a company's share price, fell 12% to 129 campaigns launched during the first six months of 2025, compared with 147 a year ago, according to numbers compiled by investment bank Barclays.

"The environment was shaped by mixed economic signals, fears about wars and geopolitical tensions and the instability created by future tariffs and trade wars," said Jim Rossman, global head of shareholder advisory at Barclays. "And taken together that is creating an environment of caution."

The slowdown comes after a record number of corporate agitators made demands last year and the pace of campaigns jumped by 17% in the first three months of this year.

Elliott Investment Management, among the world's most powerful corporate activists, pressed for changes at six companies, including BP and Hewlett Packard Enterprise, roughly half the number of campaigns it launched a year ago. But it deployed $8.8 billion in assets, the most of any activist this year.

Also so-called first-timers who were becoming more comfortable employing activist tactics last year stepped to the sidelines late in the first half.

During the second quarter when stock markets gyrated as Trump threatened harsher tariffs only to reverse course before suggesting them again, campaigns launched by first-timers dropped 27% from the first quarter of this year, the data show.

But the slowdown does not hint at a pause in activity or suggest activist investors are going soft, Rossman said.

Corporate agitators, including Mantle Ridge, Ancora Holdings and Jana Partners have, as a group, forced bigger changes at companies in the first half of this year than a year ago, the data show.

Settlements between activist investors and companies jumped 32% to 37 in the first half of 2025 and left activists with 86 board seats, marking a 16% increase. They won seats, often a measure of success for activists, at companies ranging from industrial gases maker Air Products and Chemicals to food processing company Lamb Weston.

"As a group activists are having a strong year, winning settlements and board seats and managing to engage with a number of companies privately," Rossman said.

Most activists continue to focus their attention on companies in the United States with 60 campaigns launched, down from 61 a year earlier. There were 37 campaigns in Japan, down from 51 a year ago. Activity in Europe declined by 17% to 24 campaigns launched in the first half compared with a year ago.

(Reporting by Svea Herbst-Bayliss; Editing by Stephen Coates)