Cathie Wood, the force behind Tesla’s spectacular surge, is having her worst run in a year as Ark’s big bets falter from Square to Teladoc Health

Cathie Wood’s Ark Innovation ETF has plunged 25 per cent over three weeks
Other funds like the Ark Next Generation Internet ETF and the Ark Genomic Revolution ETF fell 5.3 per cent and 4 per cent on Monday, respectively

Stocks

Bloomberg

Published: 11:00am, 9 Mar 2021

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Cathie Wood’s exchange-traded funds extended their losses Monday, signaling no immediate end to the selloff that has wiped 25 per cent from her flagship investing strategy over three turbulent weeks.

That’s the longest stretch of weekly losses for the Ark Innovation ETF since the Covid-spurred meltdown last year, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The fund fell for a fifth straight day, losing 5.8 per cent, with other products from Wood’s Ark Investment Management falling in lockstep.

Speaking in an interview with Bloomberg TV Monday night, Wood said the market is experiencing a rotation out of high-growth companies and into value stocks that is “happening very quickly” and is a sign of the bull market broadening. Her strategy in such an environment is to treat her more liquid holdings such as Facebookand Apple as “cash-like instruments” and concentrate her funds in higher-conviction stocks.

A broadening market “is good news,” she said. “We keep our eye on the prize. We have a five-year time horizon.”

A glance at some of the biggest Ark holdings helps explain the firm’s current woes: Tesla, its top bet, dropped 5.8 per cent Monday, while Square plunged 6.7 per cent, and Teladoc Health declined 6.9 per cent. All of them have been tumbling in recent weeks.

Those stocks have been some of the hottest on Wall Street, surging amid a shift to online working and the election of US President Joe Biden raising expectations of a policy boost for electric vehicles. Now, the prospect of rising inflation amid an economic recovery is driving up bond yields, making the highest priced equities less attractive. The Nasdaq 100 extended its drop to 11 per cent from its all-time high, while the 10-year Treasury rate rose toward 1.6 per cent.

The prolonged run of losses across Wood’s funds represents the biggest test yet for the firm she founded in 2014. Investors poured billions of dollars into her ETFs in recent months inspired by Ark’s stellar returns in 2020.

The latest data showed that Wood’s main fund recorded a small inflow on Thursday, even as it dropped 5.3 per cent. Other funds like the Ark Next Generation Internet ETF and the Ark Genomic Revolution ETF each saw more than US$180 million in outflows during the latest session. Those funds fell 5.3 per cent and 4 per cent on Monday, respectively.

Short interest in ARKK, as measured by the percentage of available shares that are on loan, has climbed to a record of more than 5 per cent, according to data from IHS Markit. Bearish bets had eased slightly on Thursday.

Still, ARKK has yet to see a large-scale investor exodus despite the recent trouble, possibly due to dip buyers snapping up cheaper shares. Plus the fund is still up more than 100 per cent in the past year.

“For high-flying niche ETFs that hit a rough patch, money historically has left more slowly than it came in, and we expect ARKK’s flows to be similarly mixed for some time,” Eric Balchunas, ETF analyst for Bloomberg Intelligence analyst, wrote in a recent note.

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