Cathie Wood, veteran investor and CEO of ARK Invest, remains bullish on the cryptocurrency industry and centralized exchanges (CEX) despite the bear market and the crypto crisis.
Wood’s investment management firm ARK continues accumulating the stock of the major United States cryptocurrency exchange, Coinbase.
On Jan. 5, ARK purchased 144,463 Coinbase (COIN) shares for allocation by its financial technology-focused fund, ARK Fintech Innovation ETF (ARKF), according to a trade notification seen by Cointelegraph. At the time of writing, the purchase is worth $4.8 million, with COIN closing at $33.5 on Thursday.
On the same day, ARK also bought 27,813 COIN shares ($900,000) to be allocated to its internet technology-focused fund, ARK Next Generation Internet ETF (ARKW). Together, the funds have added a total of $5.7 million worth of Coinbase’s stock.
Launched in 2019, ARKF invests in equity securities of companies that ARK believes are transforming financial services and economic transactions to technology infrastructure platforms. Coinbase is one of the biggest holdings in the fund, accounting for 7.7% of its total assets.
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ARKW is focused on equities of companies relevant to ARK’s investment theme of the next generation of the internet. ARKW is an older fund, starting operations in 2014. As of Jan. 5, Grayscale Bitcoin Trust and Coinbase are among the top 10 holdings by ARKW, accounting for 5.4% and 4.8% of its entire assets.
According to data from TradingView, both funds have lost more than 50% of value year-over-year, which comes in line with the ongoing crypto bear market.
While ARK’s funds dropped about 50%, the Coinbase stock plummeted about 87% since last year. ARK’s latest COIN stock purchases mark another bullish move by the company as the ARK has been actively buying the dip before. In November 2022, ARK bought $12.1 million in Coinbase shares despite turbulent markets triggered by the FTX collapse. As of late November, ARK’s total COIN stake almost reached all-time highs, or 8.7 million.