When you think of the world’s greatest investors, plenty of names come to mind. Warren Buffet, Elon Musk, or Mark Cuban are some of the world’s most famous investors. However, there is a much less famous person who may be one of the world’s smartest and savviest investors of our generation. Although not a household name yet, Cathie Wood is arguably one of the greatest investors of the modern age. Cathie Wood’s investments in the stock market this past year has outperformed the huge majority of investors and her following has been ever-growing. So, who is Cathie Wood?
Cathie Wood has spent her entire career in the field of economics and finance. However, her recent endeavors into investing have garnered a great deal of attention from the finance world. Cathie Wood is the CEO and founder of ARK Investment Management. Her Investment Management firm currently boasts $29 billion assets under management. (As of Oct. 13, 2020) (1) The ETF she founded, Ark Innovation Fund, focuses on “disruptive innovation”. Meaning innovation that disrupts the current economic status quo. According to Forbes, “Ark Innovation Fund has returned an average of nearly 40 percent annually over the past five years.” (2) As the CEO of an exchange-traded fund, Wood and her team pick stocks in order to help their ETF perform well on the stock market.
Her ETFs has some of the most innovative companies on the entire stock market. A complete list of the ETF’s holdings can be found here: https://ark-funds.com/arkk. Some of the notable stocks held by the ETF include Tesla, Square, Shopify, and Zoom. (3) The ETF’s risky stock picks have made it one of the best performing ETFs on the market. At The Mutual Fund Industry and ETF Awards, ARK was awarded Active ETF of the Year. (4) Cathie Wood’s leadership of the ETF has also garnered some personal accolades as well.
As Bloomberg Opinions writes, “Wood beat every stock picker by betting on the innovators in DNA development who are rescuing the world from the global pandemic.” (5) Cathie Wood’s extremely smart stock picks have garnered attention from financial media across the United States. Many financial analysts have even compared her to the stock genius Warren Buffet. Wood’s stock’s intelligence has garnered attention from the financial media as well as regular retail investors.
Cathie Wood’s ARK ETFs are some of the best performing ETFs on the stock market and her success in the stock market comes down to her aggressive and “bullish” positions on risky companies such as Tesla. (A bullish investor, also known as a bull, believes that the price of one or more securities will rise.) (6) Wood’s smart positions have made her ETF have incredible gains despite a stock market that was underperforming as a result of the pandemic. Like the STEM field, the finance field is lacking in female representation. Cathie Wood’s impressive success in the stock market is paving the way for future female financial investors. Historically, the stock market was reserved for white, rich, white men, however, with the rise of online, free stock trading, everyday investors, men or women, white or black, can get in on the action. Cathie Wood’s achievements will pave the way for millions of women to make money trading on the stock market, and that is something we should all be celebrating.
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https://www.bloombergquint.com/gadfly/ark-s-cathie-wood-bets-on-dna-innovators
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https://www.bloombergquint.com/gadfly/ark-s-cathie-wood-bets-on-dna-innovators