Sell AMD, reduce Tesla holdings—Cathie Wood invests $440 million heavily in SpaceX

Sell AMD, reduce Tesla holdings—Cathie Wood invests $440 million heavily in SpaceX

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"Wood has placed her biggest bet on SpaceX."

On June 12, Cathie Wood’s ARK Invest disclosed its latest trading records. On this day, several ARK ETFs collectively bought about 3.29 million shares of SpaceX, with a total amount of about $443 million.

Notably, this purchase was made via the ARK Venture Fund, a fund dedicated to private market investments. In other words, this was not a purchase of shares in the secondary market, but an acquisition of shares via a private placement before the IPO.

At the same time, ARK significantly reduced its holdings in mature technology stocks such as AMD, Tesla, and Baidu, freeing up funds to concentrate on the space sector. This series of moves paints a clear picture of ARK's current asset reallocation direction.

After this purchase, SpaceX has become the largest holding of the ARK Venture Fund, accounting for 11.38% of the fund’s net assets (as of May 31 data).

What did they buy with $443 million?

The SpaceX shares that ARK bought came from the private market, rather than a public exchange.

This means the pricing of these shares depends on private market negotiations, instead of continuous quotes from the public market. Before SpaceX officially goes public, these holdings cannot be traded at will like ordinary stocks.

According to Crypto Briefing, SpaceX filed a confidential S-1 draft on April 1, 2026, aiming to list on NASDAQ, with an IPO target valuation as high as $1.75 trillion. If successful, SpaceX would become one of the world’s most valuable companies on its first trading day—a scale that has taken many tech giants decades to achieve.

ARK first entered SpaceX at the end of 2023, when the company was valued at less than $200 billion. ARK then continued to increase its position, and further boosted its exposure through the merger of SpaceX and xAI in early 2026. By 2024, SpaceX’s valuation had risen to $350 billion.

What was sold: Significant reductions in AMD, Tesla, and Baidu

To make room for SpaceX, ARK’s selling list on this day was quite extensive.

According to Reuters, ARK sold a total of about 80,000 shares of AMD through the ARKQ, ARKW, and ARKX ETFs, cashing out about $39.3 million, continuing a previous trend of reducing its AMD position.

On the same day, ARK also reduced its holdings in:

  • Tesla: about 39,900 shares, for about $15.9 million
  • Baidu: about 67,400 shares, for about $7.83 million
  • Roku: about 98,800 shares, for about $11.82 million (a reduction for two consecutive days)
  • Rocket Lab: about 50,700 shares, for about $5.82 million
  • Also reduced holdings in CrowdStrike, Cloudflare, Veracyte, and several other stocks

Looking at the list of sales, ARK reduced its holdings in chips (AMD), streaming media (Roku), autonomous driving (Tesla), as well as cybersecurity (CrowdStrike, Cloudflare), and genomics (10X Genomics)—almost a comprehensive slimming down of its existing technology positions, with funds being concentrated into the single bet on SpaceX.

Number one position, but concentration risk cannot be ignored

SpaceX accounts for 11.38% of the ARK Venture Fund's net assets, making it the fund's single largest position.

It is worth noting that this percentage was even higher at 17.02% as of March 31 this year, but has since declined—possibly due to ARK's active rebalancing, or relatively higher appreciation of other holdings.

According to Crypto Briefing, ARK’s internal model is quite aggressive in its long-term valuation of SpaceX: under its base case, enterprise value in 2030 is about $2.5 trillion; in the optimistic case, about $3.1 trillion; and even in the pessimistic case, it’s about $1.7 trillion, essentially in line with the IPO target valuation.

But concentration is a double-edged sword. A single private holding that exceeds 11% means that the success or failure of SpaceX's IPO will have a direct and significant impact on the net asset value of the ARK Venture Fund. If the valuation is compressed after listing, this level of concentration will magnify the losses as well.

ARK Venture Fund: A “channel” for retail investors to enter the private market

The original purpose of the ARK Venture Fund is to allow ordinary investors to participate in the private market.

In the past, pre-IPO shares of companies like SpaceX were almost exclusively open to institutions such as pension funds and sovereign wealth funds. Through ARKVX, ARK has cracked the door open a bit for retail investors.

But the price is liquidity. Private shares cannot be sold at will, and valuations between rounds depend more on judgment than on market pricing. What investors are buying is a “waiting for IPO” story, rather than a liquid asset that can be exited at any time.

The underlying logic of this transaction

ARK’s core investment logic is that the greatest wealth creation happens before a company goes public.

SpaceX’s valuation trajectory is a powerful illustration of this logic—from less than $200 billion to the IPO target valuation of $1.75 trillion, an increase of nearly ninefold. ARK believes that if you wait until a company goes public to buy, you have already missed the juiciest part.

But this logic also has its limits: private market valuations before listing are more of an “art” than a “science.” The price discovery in public markets often serves as a revalidation for private valuations. SpaceX’s IPO will be the ultimate test of ARK’s $443 million bet.

Risk warning and disclaimerThe market carries risks; investments should be made cautiously. This article does not constitute individual investment advice and does not take into account any individual user's specific investment objectives, financial situation, or needs. Users should consider whether any opinions, viewpoints, or conclusions in this article are appropriate for their particular situation. Investments made accordingly are at your own risk. ```