Cathie Wood has spent months defending Ark Investment Management from critics who say the money manager has too much cash tied up in too few stocks. The firm’s latest move is handing them fresh ammunition.
In a filing late last week, Ark altered the prospectuses for its exchange-traded funds to remove clauses limiting its exposure and concentration risks.
The changes eliminate a 30% cap on how much of each fund’s assets could be invested in the securities of a single entity, and a 20% limit on the amount of a company’s shares an ETF could own.
Read more: Cathie Wood Risks Having Too Much Money and Not Enough Stocks
It also introduced language acknowledging funds may buy into blank-check firms and noting the risks of buying shares in special-purpose acquisition companies that haven’t yet decided what businesses they’ll own. The ARK Autonomous Technology & Robotics ETF (ticker ARKQ) last week bought shares of a SPAC backed by tennis star Serena Williams.
These are eye-catching changes for Ark, founded by Wood in 2014. Concerns have swirled around the New York-based firm in recent months after a stellar year saw ETF assets surge at one point to more than $60 billion. Ark invests in companies involved with disruptive trends, which mean it has a limited pool of targets in which to deploy that money.
“It seems like they’re willing to take on more single-stock risk if they truly believe in a company,” said Mohit Bajaj, director of ETFs for WallachBeth Capital. “It’s truly active management.”
