Cathie Wood’s ARK Writes Down Twitter Stake by 47% Elon Musk’s social-media company is struggling with heavy debt load By Jack Pitcher Updated July 17, 2023 4:23 pm ET Cathie Wood’s ARK Investment Management owns a small stake in Twitter through its venture fund. PHOTO: DAVID SWANSON/REUTERS Cathie Wood’s ARK Investment Management has written down its stake in Twitter by 47% since Elon Musk took the social-media company private last year, Wood said in an interview. “We take fair valuation very seriously and absolutely have had to write that [Twitter] down,” Wood said Friday. “The write-down is not representative of our fundamental outlook and belief in the long-term return on investment we believe that it will have for our shareholders.” Wood is still bullish on Twitter’s long-term outlook. She said her fund updates its internal valuations of private companies frequently. “I would love to get more stock at these price levels actually, but no one wants to let any go. So that tells you something,” she added. ARK owns a small stake in Twitter through its venture fund, which is open to the public and includes public-market and private investments. Twitter is dealing with a heavy debt load and a steep drop in advertising following Musk’s $44 billion leveraged buyout. Advertising revenue is down roughly 50% and the company has negative cash flow, Musk said in a tweet Saturday. Twitter owner Elon Musk and Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg have agreed to a cage match. A physical fight might be a first but WSJ’s Joanna Stern breaks down—with the help of action figures—why this tech brawl is actually like past Silicon Valley beefs. Photo Illustration: Kenny Wassus, Preston Jessee The company also faces a threat from the new microblogging app Threads, which was launched by Meta Platforms this month as a direct competitor to Twitter. Twitter has alleged that Meta might have stolen intellectual property, which Meta denied. Threads, which is linked to Instagram, has signed up more than 100 million users. “We think they can coexist,” Wood said of Threads and Instagram. “I think Threads has lit the competitive fire or taken it up a notch and it will be good for Twitter. We also think that longer term, Elon and team are very serious that they’re going to turn this into an everything app.” Musk has said that buying Twitter will help him create “an everything app” that could marry information with entertainment and grow to over a billion users in five to 10 years if successful. Other assets managers including Fidelity Investments have significantly written down their Twitter investments. Fidelity valued Twitter at one-third of what Musk paid for it as of April 28, according to a monthly disclosure.
The price of free speech. Musk and other twitter investors have done the world a favour. In 2012 elite narrative was that social media was fantastic as it resulted in the Arab spring. 2016 Trump uses social media to get elected and unelected elites made certain social media was censored.
Why did Elon buy Twitter in the first place? He should have focused on making spaceships to go to Mars. Running Twitter is relatively simple. Why did Cathie Wood buy Twitter in the first place? We are saturated with twittering things.
The price of misjudging the size of libertarians and fringe right wingers in America versus the size of the silent majority. Free speech is a misnomer. What people like you really want is to spew hatred without feeling guilty. It's an adrenaline rush to shock generally accepted behavior and taking advantage of the internet pupitre to say out loud what the fringe right couldn't finance since the defeat of neo nazism and fascism.
Lol... Did you finish high school or are you mentally challenged enough that you can only understand life in very simple terms?
You believe in free speech to question my educational abilities but are quite happy that government censors social media. Hypocritical.