Cathie Wood 首尔受访称 CoreWeave 将凭 AI 需求走出债务担忧，并称 ARK 本周下跌中加仓 CoreWeave 与 Cerebras

Concerns over CoreWeave Inc.’s high borrowing costs are common for young companies raising money when interest rates are elevated, but investing in the AI computing supplier will pay off, according to Cathie Wood of ARK Investment Management LLC.

The cloud-computing service provider has been at the center of unease this week over the sustainability of AI funding, as its bonds traded at distressed levels and a measure of its credit risk hit an all-time high. Shares rebounded on Thursday following a three-day, 20% slump after Jensen Huang, chief executive officer of Nvidia Corp., which is CoreWeave’s second-largest shareholder, said the company’s cost of capital is falling.

Huang’s comments underscored CoreWeave’s importance to the AI ecosystem, which is at a “very early” stage, Wood said in an interview in Seoul Friday. She compared CoreWeave to Coinbase, whose bonds came under pressure before the company eventually benefited from the growth of the crypto industry.

“Coinbase has evolved into a very strong, robust company and anyone who bought back then has been rewarded handsomely,” she said. “This happens very often with young companies.” ARK Investment added both CoreWeave and Cerebras Systems Inc.during this week’s declines, Wood said.

Read: CoreWeave Risk Gauge Soars, Pricing In 60% Chance of Default

The South Korean stock market, which is dominated by the two memory chipmakers Samsung Electronics Co. and SK Hynix Inc., bore the brunt of global unraveling of the AI trade this week. The benchmark Kospi plunged 14% this week alone, its worst performance since 2008.

“The fear out there actually is good,” she said. “I’m talking about fear that AI, we’re in a hype cycle. We do not believe we are, but the fact people are afraid means we are not in a bubble.”

She visited Seoul to discuss a partnership with Hanwha Asset Management to introduce her firm’s exchange-traded products to South Korea.

Wood, who made her name with early bets on disruptive technology, is bullish on AI’s transformative power in the decades to come.

Read more: ARK’s Wood Shuns Memory Chip Sector on ‘Vicious’ Cycle Risk

“While some people might say we’re in the first inning, we would say we’re still in the parking lot before we entered the baseball game,” she said. “We’re very optimistic about semiconductors generally, about cloud computing, neo-cloud computing, because we’ve barely begun in AI.”

Still, she said the current high level of memory-chip prices are unlikely to sustain. The surge helped drive record earnings growth at South Korean companies and boosted the nation’s export growth, with the country’s two biggest chipmakers benefiting from the boom.

“We need China and others to come in because we have to solve the problem of prices increasing on consumer devices because that’s hurting demand,” Wood said.