Over the past five years, ARK Invest’s ARK Innovation ETF (BATS:ARKK) has declined 14.91%, while the Invesco QQQ Trust (NASDAQ:QQQ) has gained 111.60%. Cathie Wood responded to this contrast by calling it an “incorrect comparison” and attributing the five-year figures to “endpoint sensitivity.”
The Performance Debate at HOOD Summit
At the HOOD Summit ’26, audience member Kevin Avery questioned Wood’s credentials, stating that ARK Invest funds have underperformed QQQ since inception, asking why she was invited “where there are many people who are putting their money, expecting great returns.”
Performance data highlights this divergence over a five-year timeframe, with ARKK dropping 14.91% as QQQ surged 111.60%. In a subsequent X post regarding the event, Wood stated that investors “deserve to understand both their returns and the decisions behind them.”
She added that ARKK and QQQ have a different mandate, which “doesn’t remove accountability for performance,” but rather “provides essential context for evaluating it.” Wood rejected the premise of measuring ARKK against QQQ, telling the audience, “That is an incorrect comparison because we are focused on technologically enabled innovation across all sectors.”
In her X post, Wood elaborated that QQQ tracks the Nasdaq-100 Index, while ARK actively invests in disruptive innovation, which “creates a different portfolio, with different exposures and risks.”
Endpoint Sensitivity and Category Rankings
During the panel, Wood defended her firm’s historical record by pointing to different time horizons. She told the summit audience that there is a lot of “endpoint sensitivity involved” when looking exclusively at a five-year record.
Wood claimed that based on one-year, three-year, and 10-year inception-to-date metrics up to the end of August, ARK’s performance ranks in the “top 5%-10% in each of those periods of the Morningstar database in our category.”
Divergent Portfolios and Healthcare Focus
Speaking at the summit, Wood noted that QQQ is not involved in healthcare and barely involved in financial services, concluding, “There’s no comparison.” By contrast, she stated that “roughly 30%, 25%-30% of our portfolio right now is in healthcare,” a sector she characterized as the “most profound application of AI.”
A review of ARKK’s October 2026 holdings data confirms this allocation, showing a 28.32% weight across healthcare and biotechnology companies, including major positions in Tempus AI Inc. (NASDAQ:TEM), CRISPR Therapeutics AG (NASDAQ:CRSP), and Twist Bioscience Corp. (NASDAQ:TWST).
How Have ARKK and QQ Performed?
| Stocks | 5-Days | 1-Month | 6-Months | YTD | 1-Year | 5-Years |
| ARKK | 3.96% | 7.61% | 35.33% | 19.15% | 5.05% | -14.91% |
| QQQ | 2.67% | 5.18% | 29.27% | 23.10% | 25.37% | 111.60% |
Disclaimer: This content was partially produced with the help of AI tools and was reviewed and published by Benzinga editors.
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