- Teladoc stock has cost Cathie Wood's Ark Invest more than $2 billion in losses amid its recent implosion.
- The disruptive investor had built its Teladoc stake to be its second largest position across all of its ETFs.
- Even after Teladoc dropped almost 50% in a day last week, Ark bought more shares and said it remains bullish on the company.
Cathie Wood's Ark Invest has lost more than $2 billion on its Teladoc position, which at one point was its second largest across all of its ETFs, just behind Tesla.
On Thursday, Teladoc plunged nearly 50% to $33 per share after the company reported disappointed first-quarter earnings.
According to Cathie's Ark, a website that tracks the daily trades of the innovation-focused investor, Ark's stake in Teladoc across all of its ETFs has a weighted average cost of about $165 per share. Ark had purchased shares in Teladoc as high as $225 per share in 2021.
But Ark isn't backing down from its bullishness on Teladoc, as the investment manager purchased more than 600,000 shares of the company on Thursday as the stock was in free-fall. Ark now owns 18.2 million shares in Teladoc worth about $615 million, which means Ark owns more than 11% of the company's outstanding shares.
In an e-mail to its investors on Friday, Ark laid out why it remains bullish on Teladoc despite the disappointing earnings results and massive stock price decline.
"For perspective, Teladoc previously traded at these levels when it was cashflow negative in 2017. Compared to 2017, its visit volumes are 5x higher, its paid member count is twice as high, annual revenue is 5x higher, it is cashflow positive, and 1 in 6 Americans is a full Teladoc member," Ark said.
Given that underlying business growth, ARK is committed to its Teladoc position, which recently fell from its second largest position across all of its ETFs to its eighth largest position.
"Our five-year thesis for Teladoc is built around the company's transition from a general telehealth provider to a B2B enterprise solution for whole-person healthcare," Ark told its investors.
"To measure the company's progress, we track utilization – which has increased 160% since 2019 – multi-service adoption – which has increased from 67% to 78% over the past year – and competitive wins," Ark said.
But while Teladoc may have grown its adjusted for non-cash stock-based compensation EBITDA considerably over the past few years, the company still lowered its profit outlook and is facing intense competition from other healthcare providers.
"Given the tumultuous market dynamics in digital care, management would have served shareholders and other stakeholders better with a strategy of under-promising and over-delivering. Nonetheless, we do believe that Teladoc's long-term competitive position and product differentiation are unmatched, gearing it for superior growth over the long term," Ark concluded.