Tesla's (TSLA) -) billions of outstanding shares are largely owned by institutional and retail investors, though the company's CEO, Elon Musk, has a nearly 13% stake in the company, worth around $90 billion, according to the Nasdaq.
Institutional investors, such as Vanguard and BlackRock, own more than 40% of Tesla's stock. Among them, Cathie Wood's Ark Invest, bullish on promises of autonomous tech and artificial intelligence, has been a prominent Tesla shareholder for a long time.
Related: Cathie Wood's favorite tech stock is facing a telling new problem
Despite Ark's confidence in Tesla and Musk, the firm has been known to cut its holdings on occasion.
Ark Invest sold more than 30,000 shares of Tesla Sept. 14, valued at around $8.4 million. The move was spread across two of Ark's funds: Ark Innovation dumped 20,424 shares and Ark Next Generation Internet dumped 9,965 shares.
The sell-off comes just a day after Ark sold more than 50,000 shares of Tesla, worth around $13.8 million.
More on Ark Invest:
- Cathie Wood knows how the U.S. economy can avoid a recession
- Cathie Wood slashes Tesla holdings to bet big on an unusual company
- Cathie Wood takes $1 million out of a wildly successful stock before earnings
Ark Innovation's Tesla holding still remains its largest holding by a wide margin; its 3.2 million shares, worth $887.9 million, are weighted at 11.46% of the fund.
Tesla's stock, closing Sept. 14 at $276.04 per share, has been rising over the past few days.
The first boost occurred Sept. 11, when Morgan Stanley boosted its price target from $250 to $400, citing the value of Tesla's supercomputing technology and noting that Tesla is more than just a car company.
“This is not an auto play. This is an autonomous taxi platform play with software-as-a-service like margins,” Wood has said of the company. "Tesla should trade like a technology stock and not like traditional automakers, something that analysts and Tesla bears can’t grasp."
Tesla's stock rose in pre-market trading, opening at $277.55 amid news of United Auto Workers strikes against the Big Three legacy automakers.
If you work for Tesla, contact Ian by email ian.krietzberg@thearenagroup.net or Signal 732-804-1223
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