Cathie Wood is always making moves. The co-founder, CEO, and investment manager of Ark Invest publishes daily transactions for her family of exchange-traded funds. We know what’s she’s selling. More importantly for this column’s purposes, we know what she’s buying.
Wood added to three existing positions to kick off the new trading week, buying more shares in 3D Systems (NYSE: DDD), Blade Air Mobility (NASDAQ: BLDE), and Recursion Pharmaceuticals (NASDAQ: RXRX) on Monday. Let’s take a closer look at her latest purchases, which all happen to be stocks trading for less than $10 a share.
1. 3D Systems
3D Systems isn’t the company that it used to be. It was a rock star a dozen years ago, leading the way of the 3D printing revolution. Now it’s struggling. Revenue is declining for the third year in a row. Its trailing revenue is a third less than it was when its business peaked in 2018.
It’s also one of this year’s biggest losers, shedding more than half of its value in 2024. The pioneer of additive manufacturing has stumbled. It started with a disappointing fourth-quarter report in February. The company fell short of analyst expectations on both ends of the income statement. Then it offered disappointing revenue guidance for all of 2024.
Things got worse.
Image source: Getty Images.
There was a repeat performance six months later. 3D Systems once again fell short of expectations. If investors were displeased in the springtime, when 3D Systems revealed that it was modeling just $475 million to $505 million in revenue, you can imagine how revised guidance for $450 million to $460 million now sounds.
Investor appetite for 3D printing stocks has cooled. 3D Systems hasn’t delivered an operating profit over the past decade. The one time it did serve up a reported profit in 2021, it was entirely the handiwork of an asset sale. The good news here is that analysts see revenue growing again next year. Losses are also expected to narrow. The long-term bullish catalysts may take some time to emerge, but Wood isn’t afraid to buy on the dip — even when that dip is more like a belly…
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