Cathie Wood Says Tesla Can Win Without Conquering a Controversial Feature

We could all use someone who supports us as much as famed investment strategist Cathie Wood supports Tesla  (TSLA) - Get Free Report and CEO Elon Musk. 

Wood was even more effusive with her praise of Musk than she normally is, calling the business magnate "our Renaissance man" and the "inventor of our age" during a conference hosted by Axios in San Francisco this week.

Forget Tesla -- find out why we're all-in on this EV stock

But Wood's most curious comments came when she said that it was inconsequential whether Tesla ever achieves its self-driving ambitions, saying that she is not concerned whether autonomous driving fails or regulators shut it down over safety concerns, Investors Business Daily reported. 

This would seem to be a departure from Wood's bull case for the automaker. 

Earlier this year Wood set a $2,000 price target for Tesla -- the stock currently trades at at $167 per share -- by 2027 and said "a good part of that (the price target) is Autopilot."

Even so, Wood isn't concerned about the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's current investigation into self-driving technology, telling Axios that the data suggests that Autopilot makes driving safer. 

Tesla is the largest holding in Ark Investment, representing about 9.8% of the firm's portfolio. Ark has purchased 1.64 million shares of Tesla so far in 2023.

Year to date, Tesla shares are up nearly 40%.