Ark Invest’s Busy Day: Notable Trades Involve Palantir, Tesla, Reddit, and Amazon
Cathie Wood’s influential investment firm, Ark Invest, has been actively shaping its portfolio with a series of strategic trades, focusing on companies like Palantir Technologies, Tesla, Reddit, and Amazon.com. These moves come at a time of heightened market volatility, offering insights into Ark Invest’s investment strategies and their outlook on these prominent companies.
Palantir’s Rollercoaster Ride
Ark Invest’s decision to sell Palantir shares comes amidst a turbulent day for the data analytics company. Palantir’s stock experienced a rollercoaster ride, initially dipping due to a downgrade from Jefferies. However, the stock rebounded following the announcement of a partnership with Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Anthropic, a leading artificial intelligence (AI) company. Despite Jefferies analyst Brent Thill downgrading Palantir from a Hold rating to an Underperform rating due to valuation concerns, Palantir’s stock has seen a surge of over 220% since the start of the year. This includes a 30% increase in just the past week, fueled by strong quarterly results driven by “unrelenting” AI demand.
Ark offloaded 264,513 Palantir shares on Thursday through its ARK Innovation ETF (ARKK) and Ark Fintech Innovation ETF (ARKF) funds, with the transaction valued at $14.8 million based on a closing share price of $55.88.
Tesla’s Continued Ride-Hailing Ambitions
Ark’s latest trade involving Tesla saw the firm selling 85,019 shares of Elon Musk-led Tesla Inc. TSLA. This is part of a recent trend of Tesla share selling by Wood’s firm. The latest transaction, which went through ARKK, was valued at $25.24 million. Wood’s firm believes that Tesla’s driverless ride-hailing service could tap into a massive $11 trillion revenue market by leveraging low operating costs to undercut existing ride-hailing prices. Tesla plans to launch this service next year in Texas and California, starting with drivers and aiming for fully autonomous rides as regulations allow.
Reddit’s Growing Influence
Ark Invest’s trade with Reddit comes at a time when the social media platform is making significant strides in its market. Reddit’s market cap recently surpassed that of Snap Inc. SNAP, reaching $21.5 billion after a 12% climb on Election Day. This is a notable achievement for the social media platform operator, which has a user base and revenue one-fourth the size of Snap’s. Reddit’s growing popularity as a source of authentic information is also posing a challenge to Google’s dominance in the internet search market. This trend was highlighted at a recent conference hosted by The Wall Street Journal, where a journalist revealed she primarily uses Google Search to access Reddit for information. The Wood-led firm sold 62,389 Reddit shares from its ARK Next Generation Internet ETF (ARKW) fund on Thursday, a transaction valued at $8.2 million. Reddit shares closed the day 8.6% higher at $131.44.
Amazon’s Insider Selling
Ark Invest’s decision to purchase Amazon shares comes at a time when insiders at the e-commerce giant have been selling off their shares. According to a recent Benzinga report, Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s executive chair, recently sold 1.07 million shares of Amazon stock at $200.07 per share, raking in approximately $213.8 million. This left Bezos with 926.41 million shares of Amazon. Bezos was not the only Amazon insider selling shares. Recently, director Jonathan Rubinstein also offloaded $1 million worth of shares, while Douglas Herrington, CEO of Worldwide Amazon Stores, sold $696,360 worth of Amazon shares. Ark acquired 150,675 Amazon shares through its ARKK fund, a transaction valued at $31.6 million. Amazon’s stock closed Thursday at $210.16, up 1.5%.
Other Notable Trades
In addition to these major moves, Ark also made other noteworthy trades. The firm purchased shares of 10X Genomics Inc. (TXG) and sold shares of Moderna Inc (MRNA). Ark also picked up shares of Illumina Inc. (ILMN), ABSCI Corp (ABSI), and Guardant Health Inc. (GH) but sold shares of Unity Software Inc. (U), Sofi Technologies Inc. (SOFI), and Repare Therapeutics Inc. (RPTX).
