Cathie Wood's Ark Invest snapped up nearly 6.5 million shares of a leading biotechnology firm, Ginkgo Bioworks, Aug. 10. The trade -- which was worth around $11 million -- was spread across two of Ark's ETFs.
Ark Innovation (ARKK) -) picked up the bulk of the purchase, acquiring around 5.1 million shares of the company. The Ark Genomic Revolution ETF picked up 1.3 million shares of the biotech company.
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Ginkgo Bioworks (DNA) -) has been a favorite of Ark Invest for a while. Ark Innovation's holding in the company totals more than 118 million shares, worth around $207 million and weighted at 2.65% of the fund. Ark's Genomic Revolution fund owns 52.1 million shares of the company, worth $91.2 million and weighted at 4.3% of the ETF.
Ginkgo, which is focused on cell programming and biosecurity, reported a 44% drop in revenue from the previous year in its second-quarter earnings Aug. 9. The company earned $81 million for the quarter, compared to the $145 million it raked in a year ago.
But Ginkgo said that its Cell Engineering Services revenue was up 72%, and its Biosecurity revenue -- at $35 million -- had a gross profit margin of 49%.
Ginkgo noted an operational loss of $184 million for the quarter, far narrower than the $648 million loss the company noted last year. The company said it is expecting revenue of $245 to $260 million for the full year.
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"I'm really energized by the work that we have done at Ginkgo this past quarter," Jason Kelly, co-founder and CEO of Ginkgo said in a statement. "While we still have much more to do, many of the investments we have made to make biology more like an engineering discipline are paying off."
Ginkgo's stock surged between May and July, peaking at $2.5 per share on July 31 before taking a bit of a tumble. The stock is currently trading at $1.75.
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