Cathie Wood Goes Bargain Hunting: 3 Stocks She Just Bought
- - Cathie Wood Goes Bargain Hunting: 3 Stocks She Just Bought
Rick Munarriz, The Motley FoolAugust 11, 2025 at 11:07 PM
Key Points -
Wood added to her positions in The Trade Desk, Pinterest, and Exact Sciences on Friday.
The Trade Desk and Pinterest tumbled on Friday after posting disappointing financial results.
Exact Sciences has seen its shares slide 13% since posting a poorly received financial update on Wednesday afternoon.
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Cathie Wood is one of the country's best known growth investors, but sometimes, she acts like an umbrella-toting value investor. The Ark Invest co-founder, CEO, and chief investment officer is often adding to some of her sinking positions on any given market day, and that's exactly what she did on the final trading day of last week.
Ark Invest added to existing positions in The Trade Desk (NASDAQ: TTD) and Pinterest (NYSE: PINS) on Friday. The two stocks opened sharply lower, eventually closing with double-digit declines for the trading day. She also bought more Exact Sciences (NASDAQ: EXAS), perhaps taking advantage of that stock's 5% slide.
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Here's a closer look at some of Wood's latest investments.
1. The Trade Desk
Just three weeks after The Trade Desk was added to the S&P 500, the programmatic-advertising specialist was the biggest sinker of the index on Friday. The Trade Desk's 39% plunge was dramatic and, in the eyes of Wood (one would assume), an overreaction. It was the largest single-day slide for The Trade Desk in its nearly nine years as a public company.
Business is slowing this summer for the adtech leader. Revenue rose 19% in the second quarter that it reported after Thursday's market close. It's the first time outside of the second quarter in 2020 -- when pandemic shutdowns slammed the brakes on ad spending -- that year-over-year top-line gains failed to top 20%.
This wasn't a deal-breaker. Analysts were actually bracing for a slightly softer uptick in revenue. It's the continuing deceleration of the business heading into the second half of this year that led to investors cooling on The Trade Desk.
Someone trying to catch dollar bills falling from above.
Image source: Getty Images.
Fresh guidance calls for The Trade Desk to deliver revenue of $717 million for the third quarter, decelerating to a 14% growth rate on the top line in the current quarter. Analysts are now forecasting a modest 12% increase in the fourth quarter.
The news is even more problematic on the bottom line. Instead of enjoying the scalability that has seen The Trade Desk's profitability outpace already impressive revenue gains, margins are feeling the pinch.
The company's adjusted earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization (EBITDA) margin contracted during the second quarter, and adjusted net income rose a mere 3%. It's a rare report that finds The Trade Desk not exceeding Wall Street profit targets.
New guidance has adjusted EBITDA rising just 8% for the current quarter, and that's with new CFO Laura Schenkein warning that tariff uncertainty could lead to even more turbulent results as the quarter plays out if advertisers pare back on industry spending. A change in CFO at a time like this also isn't ideal.
There's nothing inherently wrong with The Trade Desk's platform. Investors are concerned about a stock that has historically commanded a juicy market premium running into some growing pains.
Some bears may argue that this isn't the end of the carnage. Several analysts downgraded the stock between Friday and Monday, instead of merely lowering their price targets but remaining bullish. I disagree.
Picking up The Trade Desk for 25 times next year's projected earnings seems pretty opportunistic for a company going through a cyclical slowdown that should reverse as early as next year. Wood appears to agree with my disagreement.
2. Pinterest
Shares of Pinterest tumbled 10% on Friday after the company posted mixed financial results. Revenue rose 17% to $998 million, topping market expectations. Adjusted earnings grew nearly twice as fast, but the 33% jump on the bottom line actually fell shy of analyst estimates.
The popularity of the social bookmarking platform continues to grow. Global monthly active users have risen 11% over the past year to a record 578 million. Revenue is growing even faster, as Pinterest continues to boost the monetization of its audience (particularly overseas).
Even after Friday's hit, the shares are still trading 21% higher in 2025. Like The Trade Desk, Pinterest's CFO voiced some concerns about the ad market in light of the current trade war. As a free platform monetized by advertising, many of the product-promoting influencers creating content on the platform are backed by Chinese e-commerce companies offering great deals. Those rules have been changing this year.
Like The Trade Desk, this appears to be a solid long-term investment. However, the bigger opportunity could be The Trade Desk, as its stock has shed more than half of its year-to-date value.
3. Exact Sciences
Finally, there's Exact Sciences. The stock's 5% slide on Friday seems tame, compared to The Trade Desk and Pinterest, but it also tumbled 8% on Thursday. The two-day drop of 13% follows poorly received financial results.
The second-quarter results seemed solid at first glance. The provider of colorectal cancer screening solutions beat expectations on both ends of the income statement. Exact Sciences also boosted its full-year guidance by more than just the degree of the beat.
The company is known primarily for its stool-based colon cancer test, Cologuard. It has tried to carve a role in the larger market for blood-based tests with a pair of acquisitions since 2019 for more than $4 billion, a pretty big deal for a company with a market cap just double the value of those two deals. However, it announced last week that it would be paying $75 million up front -- and up to $700 million more over time -- for the exclusive U.S. licensing rights to rival Freenome's current and future colorectal cancer screening tests.
It seems to be an admission that someone else is doing a better job. However, it's also comforting to know that it can play nice and pay up to turn a competitor into a strategic partner.
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Rick Munarriz has positions in The Trade Desk. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Pinterest and The Trade Desk. The Motley Fool recommends Exact Sciences. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.
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