Famed money manager Cathie Wood, chief executive of Ark Investment Management, continued her active trading Friday, buying and selling some of her big-name stocks.
On the buy side, Ark funds purchased stock of retail host Shopify (SHOP) for the second day in a row. It was 125,506 shares, valued at $5.5 million as of Friday’s close.
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Wood was likely trying to benefit from Shopify’s 34% drop over the past year amid the slowdown in growth for e-commerce, as the pandemic has wound down.
To be sure, the stock has rebounded 26% year to date amid the bounce in technology stocks. It’s the eighth biggest holding in Wood’s flagship Ark Innovation ETF (ARKK).
Wood Pares Back Roku, Exact Sciences Stakes
On the selling side, Ark Innovation jettisoned 187,880 shares of Exact Sciences (EXAS), valued at $11.9 million as of Thursday’s close. The company is a medical diagnostics provider famous for its Cologuard at-home colon cancer test.
Exact Sciences shares have climbed 28% thus far in 2023, buoyed by strong earnings and the overall market’s rally.
That said, the stock has fallen 14% over the past year. Wood has unloaded more than 2 million Exact Sciences shares this year. But the company is still the fourth biggest holding in Ark Innovation ETF.
Ark Innovation ETF unloaded 90,287 shares of streaming platform Roku (ROKU), valued at $6.5 million as of Friday’s close.
The stock has slid 37% over the past year amid intense competition in the streaming industry, but it has soared 76% year to date. It’s the third biggest holding in Ark Innovation.
Wood’s Returns Tumble
Meanwhile, Wood’s performance hasn’t exactly overwhelmed the investment world over the past year, as her young tech stocks have slumped. Ark Innovation has slid 34% during that period and 74% from its February 2021 peak.
Still, the fund has rebounded 35% so far this year, thanks to the tech-stock surge.
Wood defends her strategy by noting that she has a five-year investment horizon. But the five-year annualized return of Ark Innovation was 1.69% through Feb. 17, compared with 10.27% for the S&P 500.
The fund’s performance also doesn’t come close to Wood’s goal for annualized returns of 15% over five-year periods.
Ark Innovation, with $7.9 billion in assets, suffered a net investment outflow of $15 million during the past five days, but enjoyed a $923 million inflow over the past year, according to ETF research firm VettaFi.
