Cathie Wood’s flagship ARK Innovation ETF on Friday carved out lows not seen in more than a year, as the technology sector suffered through an omicron-inspired repricing that brought the Nasdaq Composite Index more than halfway to correction territory.
At last check, the ARK Innovation
ARKK,
-5.54%
exchange-traded fund was down 6.4% and off more than 13% so far this week, with Friday’s decline bringing the index to around $92.43, representing the lowest point for the index since Nov. 2, 2020, according to Dow Jones Market Data.
Wood formed ARK Investment Management about seven years ago, and is listed as one of the 100 Most Influential Women in U.S. Finance by Barron’s, but her flagship fund has been pounded in recent months and now stands over 40% beneath its Feb. 15 peak, FactSet data show.
The downturn for the Ark Innovation and the broader suite of ETF offerings from Wood comes after a stellar 2020 when last year, five of ARK’s seven ETFs returned an average of 141%, on the back of gains from companies such as Tesla Inc.
TSLA,
-6.42%,
and Teladoc Health Inc.
TDOC,
-4.32%,
cementing the investors’ clout on Wall Street.
However, gains for those companies have come off the boil, with Tesla down 15% in the past 30 days and Teladoc, representing the largest holdings with ARK Innovation, off 40% over the same period.
On Friday, one of the fund’s other holdings, DocuSign
DOCU,
-42.22%,
was trading more than 40% lower, heading toward its worst day on record after the electronic-signature company’s billings and revenue forecast missed expectations and its chief executive admitted a pandemic boom wore off in the quarter.
Meanwhile, another ARK fund was also struggling. The ARK Genomic Revolution ETF
ARKG,
-4.87%
is down 25% over the past month and is off 37% in the year to date, after surging 178% last year.
The decline for ARK funds comes as, the Invesco QQQ Trust
QQQ,
-1.74%,
which tracks the Nasdaq-100 Index
NDX,
-1.74%,
by comparison was off 2.8% on the month and up 21% in the year to date. The technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite
COMP,
-1.92%
was off 4.94% in the past 30 days but up 17% so far in 2021. The index also was 6.6% from its Nov. 19 record high.
The S&P 500 index
SPX,
-0.84%
was down 3% on the month but up over 20%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average
DJIA,
-0.17%
was 4.64% lower over the past 30 days but up nearly 13% thus far in the year.
Wood has been committed to her investment approach, indicating that she didn’t plan to change course for her ETFs.
