Cathie Wood goes bargain hunting: 3 stocks she just bought this week

It seems like there’s never a bad time for Cathie Wood to rebuild her portfolio. The founder, CEO and chief stock picker of the Ark Invest family of exchange-traded funds has been busy adding to several positions this week. She’s pared down some of her holdings, but let’s talk about purchases.

Add wood to existing position meta platform (meta 0.52%), recursion medicine (RXRX -1.21%)and Ginkgo Bioworks (DNA -0.40%) this week. Let’s take a closer look.

1. Metaplatform

One of last year’s biggest winners was Meta Platforms, Facebook’s parent company. The stock price rose 194% last year, nearly tripling. I’m sure I wasn’t the only investor who shook my head when Facebook changed its name to Meta in the fall of 2021. Now, CEO Mark Zuckerberg may be having the last laugh.

The social media giant’s dream of embracing the virtual realm of the Metaverse hasn’t exactly come true yet. The Meta Quest virtual reality headset remains a niche product. But its suite of apps, including Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp, remains tremendously magnetic, attracting 3.96 million monthly active users.

Image source: Getty Images.

Sales in the latest quarter rose 21% to a massive $34.2 billion at constant currency. The biggest driver was a 31% increase in ad impressions across the company’s services, even as average revenue per ad declined 6%.

Despite the stock’s meteoric rise since bottoming out at the end of 2022, Wood believes it can continue to rise. Why else should she have bought more Meta stock on Monday? She wasn’t alone in her bullish feelings on Meta. city The target price was raised the next day.

Citi analyst Ronald Georgie raised his price target to $440 from $425, unsurprisingly sticking with his strong buy rating. Josey’s reading is that the online advertising market will perform well in the fourth quarter, which bodes well for Meta’s financial report next week. Facebook’s successful monetization of Reels, promising new advertising products, and its overall tenacious engagement have made the company’s stock a top internet stock in Citi for 2024.

2. Recurrence medicines

If you follow Wood’s daily market trades, it’s clear that she has a strong preference for Recursion Pharmaceuticals. She increased her position for 12 consecutive business days until Wednesday this week. Unlike Meta, which is a household name and one of only six stocks with a market cap of over $1 trillion, Recursion is a small-cap stock with a market cap of $2.2 billion.

Recursion is a clinical-stage technology company. It provides an operating system that leverages machine learning algorithms and searchable biological and chemical relationships to accelerate the development of potential treatments. The company’s final revenue was just $47 million, and understandably it will take years to turn a profit. However, the company has a deal in place to expand the scope of its Recursion OS platform and strengthen its artificial intelligence goals. Wood’s new purchases mean she now owns more than 10% of Recursion’s outstanding shares.

3. Ginkgo Bioworks

Many of Mr. Wood’s stock purchases were in the biotechnology sector. She has now increased her Ginkgo Bioworks stock for 6 consecutive business days. The biosecurity and biofoundry specialist reassured investors earlier this month by releasing preliminary results for fiscal 2023, after mixed results for its most recent quarter.

The company continues to expect to report revenues of $250 million to $260 million for the entire past year, based on unaudited preliminary estimates. Ginkgo Bioworks is supported by strong performance in cell engineering revenues and a cash-rich balance sheet. Wood is a believer. She currently owns almost 11% of the company’s total shares.