Cathie Wood is more or less a perma-bull when it comes to tech and artificial intelligence, and many of the exchange-traded funds (ETFs) run by Wood's firm, Ark Invest, reflect this sentiment. Wood also isn't afraid to go out on a limb. Some of her more bullish calls relate to the electric carmaker Tesla (TSLA -0.85%) and the world's largest cryptocurrency, Bitcoin (BTC 0.08%).
Specifically, Wood has said she thinks Tesla can soar to multiples of what it trades at today and reach $2,600 per share by 2030. Meanwhile, Wood thinks Bitcoin can do the same and reach at least $700,000 by 2030 and possibly as much as $1.5 million. With both projections pretty lofty, which of Wood's predictions might actually come true? Let's take a look.
Tesla to $2,600 on future initiatives
Wood's $2,600 price target implies that Tesla's stock will rise more than sevenfold from current levels of about $345. Similar to other investors betting big on Tesla, Wood is a firm believer that Tesla is much more than just an electric carmaker. She is a big believer in Tesla's unsupervised full-self-driving (FSD) technology, which the company is working on rolling out this year.
Wood believes that FSD, which will power Tesla's future robotaxi business, will comprise most of the stock's value, as much as 90% by 2030. This business, according to Wood and her team, will likely deploy a software-as-a-service (SaaS) model and generate at least 80% margins for Tesla, as opposed to the 15% to 20% that EVs do today. Tesla has a big upcoming robotaxi launch in June that many investors will be watching, and Tesla's chief executive officer, Elon Musk, said on the company's previous earnings call that he would like to see FSD ready for widespread use by year-end.
Wood is also bullish on Tesla's human-like robots, referred to as Optimus, which will supposedly be able to perform household chores. Musk said the team at Tesla expects to begin production on these robots sometime later this year and "scale Optimus up faster than any product, I think, in history, to get millions of units per year as soon as possible." Musk added that he could see Tesla producing 1 million Optimus units by 2029 or 2030. Like many of her other investments, Wood is betting that Tesla can disrupt significant parts of people's lives with its technology.
Image source: Getty Images.
Base case for Bitcoin is $700,000, and the Bull case is $1.5 Million
Wood has long been a Bitcoin bull, and the bulls have so far been right about Bitcoin, with the price of a token surpassing $100,000 on several occasions since President Donald Trump won the election last November.
If you had asked anyone a decade ago whether Bitcoin would one day hit $100,000, I think most might have laughed. But Trump's win and administration have favored crypto and the president has so far passed pro-crypto policies, installed many pro-crypto officials and cabinet members, and promised to pass favorable crypto legislation that clears up regulatory gray areas, enabling crypto businesses to move forward.
Like many who buy Bitcoin, Wood believes the cryptocurrency is a form of digital gold, with a finite supply and, therefore, it can hedge inflation. Gold has won big in recent years, and Wood and the Ark team think Bitcoin can take share from gold or garner new investors because of this attribute. Institutional investors are only just starting to get involved with crypto, and Wood thinks this activity will pick up, citing research from Ark's on-chain analyst David Puell. "We have a million more coins, roughly, to be minted ever, and institutions are just testing the waters right now," he said. "And then there's the emerging market use cases as well. So we think we have miles to go."
Tesla to $2,600 or Bitcoin to $700,000+?
Both are ambitious price targets, and it's really hard for investors -- even those as successful as Wood -- to predict a stock or asset price five years in the future, especially for volatile assets like Tesla and Bitcoin. You can probably think of these calls as more directional.
Ultimately, I see very little chance of Tesla hitting $2,600 per share in 2030. Tesla, which is trading at more than 222 times forward earnings, already looks overvalued -- likely baking in huge benefits from future initiatives such as FSD and Optimus. There's still also a lot we don't know about FSD, including potential adoption and when actual commercialization could ultimately take place. This, in my opinion, creates a less favorable risk-reward proposition right now.
While Bitcoin to $700,000 or $1.5 million also seems like a tall order, I've learned you never say never when it comes to crypto. If Bitcoin continues to be viewed as a form of digital gold, then I do expect it to keep moving higher because I think gold will move higher, too. U.S. government budgetary concerns, including a $1.8 trillion fiscal deficit and tens of trillions of total debt, make gold -- and potentially Bitcoin -- places for nervous investors to park their cash.
