Virgin Galactic’s Unity spacecraft hits Earth during a test flight of flight on May 1, 2020.
Virgin Galactic
Shares of Virgin Galactic fell on Tuesday after Ark Invest’s space exploration ETF sold nearly half of its stake in the space tourism company.
Cathie Wood’s firm sold 275,204 shares of Virgin Galactic from its ARKX fund on Monday, reducing the ETF’s stake in shares from 585,675 shares to 315,781 shares. Of the 39 ARKX holdings, Virgin Galactic was the 19th largest, but now drops to 33rd position, accounting for just over 1% of the fund’s weight.
Ark Invest also sold 315,600 Virgin Galactic shares of its ARKQ fund of “autonomous technology and robotics” on Monday. That Ark ETF holds a larger stake in Virgin Galactic, with 1.76 million shares. Together, ARKX and ARKQ hold a $ 46.7 million stake in Virgin Galactic shares as of yesterday’s closing price.
Shares of Virgin Galactic fell 7% on trading since its previous close of $ 22.46 per share, and fell as much as 10% before the day’s session.
Wood’s new space ETF only started trading late last month and many investors believed Virgin would be one of the fund’s top holdings as it was among the industry’s first pure works traded on the stock exchange. But ARKX continues to focus its larger stakes on GPS-based service company Trimble, another Ark Invest PRNT fund and a variety of aerospace and defense contractors, including Kratos, L3Harris, Komatsu, Lockheed Martin, Thales and Boeing. ARKX’s largest pure gaming space is the satellite operator Iridium Communications.
Shares of Virgin Galactic last week erased earnings in 2021, after doubling to highs above $ 60 per share in February. Losses accelerated last month after delays in its test program and commercial flights, as well as stock sales of President Chamath Palihapitiya and then-founder Richard Branson.