Cathie Wood is one of Wall Street’s most colorful, controversial and high profile money managers. When she founded Ark Investment Management 10 years ago, she already had more than 30 years in the financial industry, including 12 years at AllianceBernstein Holding LP (ticker: AB) as chief investment officer, or CIO, of its global thematic strategies division.
Today, as CIO of Ark she oversees close to $17 billion in assets under management within the Ark Invest family of exchange-traded funds and her exclusive venture capital fund, the Ark Venture Fund.
Cathie Wood is proud of her reputation as a forward-thinking investor. She believes that high-tech and scientific innovation is the key to a stock’s long-term growth potential. She looks for companies that are bringing new, disruptive technologies to market.
None of Cathie Wood’s ETFs can be considered conservative investments. They can be volatile and should be thought of as aggressive funds. That’s why she stresses the long-term nature of her family of ETFs. That said, Cathie Wood has demonstrated a talent for picking winners. When she’s right, her returns can be spectacular.
Unique among top portfolio managers, Wood publishes all of her holdings and all of her trades on a daily basis. Here are six stocks that Cathie Wood is buying now:
— Recursion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (RXRX)
— Ginkgo Bioworks Holdings Inc. (DNA)
— Ansys Inc. (ANSS)
— Nu Holdings Ltd. (NU)
— Cerus Corp. (CERS)
— 10x Genomics Inc. (TXG)
Recursion Pharmaceuticals Inc. (RXRX)
RXRX is a clinical-stage biopharmaceutical company developing treatments for debilitating diseases by applying advanced, automated data science to the fields of chemistry and human biology. They use sophisticated quantitative analysis and artificial intelligence to analyze diseases and develop treatments.
The company currently has five drugs in various stages of clinical trials and three in the preclinical trial phase. Among the treatments in the preclinical stages of development are RBM39 to treat ovarian cancer and anti-PD-L1 to assist doctors in the treatment of lung cancer and other tumors. Food and Drug Administration approval for either of these drugs is years away, but if and when it happens, it could mean blockbuster profits for the company and huge gains for shareholders.
Cathie Wood believes that RXRX’s approach to pharmaceutical research represents the future of the field. She owns it in several of her ETFs including $135 million worth in her flagship Ark Innovation ETF (ARKK). Wood has purchased more than 1 million shares so far in 2024 just for that ETF.
Ginkgo Bioworks Holdings Inc. (DNA)
Cathie Wood’s purchase of 731,000 shares of DNA on Jan. 17 of this year for inclusion in ARKK caught the eye of many investors. When she followed that up by buying an additional 755,000 shares for the fund two days later, interest in this unique company began to climb.
DNA utilizes advanced gene splicing and gene editing techniques to literally reprogram the cells of organisms and produce useful and beneficial products. The applications of its technology ranges from novel therapeutics for humans and animals to enhancing food ingredients to helping develop clean energy sources.
Their customers are pharmaceutical companies, the agricultural industry, energy companies, chemical manufactures and food processing firms.
With her recent purchases, Cathie Wood’s ARKK holds more than 124 million shares of DNA valued at just over $154 million. DNA represents 2% of that $9.3 billion ETF.
Ansys Inc. (ANSS)
The Ark Autonomous Technology & Robotics ETF (ARKQ) is a Cathie Wood ETF that invests in foreign and domestic stocks of companies that Wood feels are leading the way in robotic and autonomous technology and applications.
ARKQ is a $1 billion ETF and Cathie Wood has about 1.3%, or just over $13 million, of those assets invested in ANSS. That fact should demonstrate Wood’s conviction in the growth potential of the stock.
ANSS is a high-tech company that develops precision simulation software for engineering companies. Their products allow engineers to simulate the performance of things like bridges, skyscrapers, roadways, vehicles, aircraft and just about anything else they build. ANSS software takes thousands of variables into account and can tell product developers if something is going to work long before a prototype is built. This has tremendous potential for efficiency in design and manufacturing as well as for consumer safety.
Wood has purchased 2,600 shares of this stock for ARKQ so far this year.
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Nu Holdings Ltd. (NU)
Nu is a fintech company serving businesses and individuals in Latin and Central America. The company offers a line of proprietary debit and credit cards along with mobile payment systems that allow banking customers in Brazil, Mexico, Colombia and elsewhere to transfer money, pay bills and perform basic banking transactions. Nu offers savings and checking accounts as well. They are focused on the fast-growing small business and entrepreneurial segments of the region. They are also making inroads in the insurance markets.
Wood has been positive on NU for some time and has been accumulating it in her Ark Fintech Innovation ETF (ARKF). The fact that her NU holdings in ARKF amount to about 2.3 million shares and are worth more than $20 million is something fintech investors and Cathie Wood watchers should take notice of.
So far this January, Wood has added 323,000 shares of NU to ARKF.
Cerus Corp. (CERS)
Cerus is a California-based biomedical products company with the important goal of making the world’s supply of donated blood safer. Their flagship product is called Intercept. It’s a blood screening system that can detect harmful pathogens and other bio-contaminants in donated blood before it’s used on patients in hospitals or in emergency situations.
Wood believes in the company’s proprietary technology and understands the monumental impact CERS can have if it reaches its full potential.
Wood owns 6.1 million shares of CERS in her Ark Genomic Revolution ETF (ARKG). Those shares total over $11 million. In two purchases between Jan. 16 and Jan. 19, she bought an additional 37,000 shares of CERS stock for ARKG.
10x Genomics Inc. (TXG)
On Nov. 6, 2023, Cathie Wood bought 74,000 shares of TXG for ARKK and 33,000 shares for ARKG. The stock closed at $38.65 that day. It rose to $57.75 intraday trading on Dec. 28 and is now trading at around $41 per share. Wood has been buying the stock fairly aggressively that whole time. In fact, she accumulated about 710,000 shares for those two ETFs during her recent buying spree. Her most recent purchase was 6,300 shares for ARKG on Jan. 19.
TXG bills itself as a life science tech firm that develops software for analyzing organisms and biological systems. Its products and processes are highly sophisticated. They involve complex chemicals and precise instruments. The short description is, 10x develops and distributes equipment used to test and analyze DNA so scientists and researchers can measure genetic activity and map the details of gene expression.
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6 Stocks Cathie Wood Is Buying originally appeared on usnews.com
Update 01/25/24: This story was previously published at an earlier date and has been updated with new information.
