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17 Nov 2025, 23:24
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The drop in the company’s stock price was due to a prediction of lowered profits in the third quarter. However, this prediction would not have had a negative effect on the stock price if it were not for the company’s recent public relations failures; therefore, this failure must be overcome to prevent further drops in the stock price.
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion about how to prevent future stock price drops?
A. The company has not made many attempts to overcome its public relations failures.
B. Before the company’s public relations failures occurred, predictions of lowered profits frequently caused drops in the company’s stock price.
C. The company’s stock price dropped several times in the quarter prior to the recent prediction of lowered profits.
D. The public relations failures have not caused a decline in profit growth.
E. When public relations failures take place, other events in addition to predictions of lowered profits sometimes trigger drops in stock prices.
The OA will be automatically revealed on Wednesday 19th of November 2025 10:24:53 PM Pacific Time Zone
Which of the following, if true, would most seriously weaken the conclusion about how to prevent future stock price drops?
A. The company has not made many attempts to overcome its public relations failures.
B. Before the company’s public relations failures occurred, predictions of lowered profits frequently caused drops in the company’s stock price.
C. The company’s stock price dropped several times in the quarter prior to the recent prediction of lowered profits.
D. The public relations failures have not caused a decline in profit growth.
E. When public relations failures take place, other events in addition to predictions of lowered profits sometimes trigger drops in stock prices.
The OA will be automatically revealed on Wednesday 19th of November 2025 10:24:53 PM Pacific Time Zone
18 Nov 2025, 21:00
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B should be correct answer.
That suggests that even before PR failure, lowered profilt caused stock price decrease for the company.
That weakens the claim that stock price fall is due to PR failure.
That suggests that even before PR failure, lowered profilt caused stock price decrease for the company.
That weakens the claim that stock price fall is due to PR failure.
19 Nov 2025, 08:37
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Deconstructing the Argument:
The argument relies on a specific causal chain involving a necessary condition.
1. Fact: The stock price dropped because of a prediction of lower profits.
2. Condition (Key Premise): The author claims this prediction would not have hurt the stock price if the Public Relations (PR) failures hadn't happened.
(Translation: PR Failure is the magnifying glass that turned a profit warning into a stock drop. Without PR failure -> No drop from profit warning.)
3. Conclusion: To stop future drops, we must fix the PR failures.
Weaken Strategy:
The conclusion assumes that the PR failure is the essential "switch" allowing profit warnings to hurt the stock. To weaken this, we need to show that stock drops from profit warnings happen regardless of PR failures. If the stock drops even when PR is perfect, then fixing PR won't prevent future drops.
Analysis of the Options:
(A) Incorrect. Whether the company has tried to fix them doesn't tell us if fixing them is effective or necessary.
(B) Correct. This option attacks the core premise. The argument claims the profit prediction only hurt the stock because of the PR failure. Option (B) states that in the past (before any PR failures existed), profit predictions frequently caused stock drops anyway.
- If profit predictions cause drops even without PR failures, then simply "overcoming the PR failure" will not prevent future drops when bad profit news arrives. It proves that the PR failure is not the necessary condition the author thinks it is.
(C) Incorrect. Prior drops could be due to anything. This doesn't address the specific relationship between profit predictions, PR failures, and the current stock price mechanism.
(D) Incorrect. The argument is about stock price, not actual profit growth. Even if PR doesn't hurt actual profits, it can still hurt investor sentiment (stock price).
(E) Incorrect. The existence of "other events" that trigger drops doesn't invalidate the author's claim about this specific type of drop. The author is focusing on the mechanism involving profit predictions.
Answer: B
