Cathie Wood
Catherine Duddy Wood (born November 26, 1955) is an American investor and founder, CEO and CIO of ARK Invest, an investment management firm. Early life and education Wood was born in Los Angeles, the eldest child of immigrants from Ireland. Wood's father served in the Irish Army and the United States Air Force as a radar systems engineer. In 1974, Wood graduated from Notre Dame Academy in Los Angeles, an all-girls Catholic high school. In 1981, Wood graduated summa cum laude from the University of Southern California, with a Bachelor of Science degree in finance and economics. One of Wood's professors was economist Arthur Laffer, advisor to Presidents Reagan and Trump, who became Wood's mentor. Career In 1977, via her mentor Arthur Laffer, Wood got a job as an assistant economist at Capital Group, where she worked for three years. In 1980, she moved to New York City to take a job at Jennison Associates as chief economist, analyst, portfolio manager and managing director. She worked there for 18 years. In the early 1980s, she debated Henry Kaufman on why she believed interest rates had peaked. In 1998, along with Lulu C. Wang, Wood co-founded Tupelo Capital Management, a hedge