Cathie Wood's flagship Ark ETF just logged its best month in history as its stock darling Tesla makes a comeback

• Cathie Wood's flagship Ark Invest fund just notched its best month ever as tech stocks bounce back.
• The famed money manager's Ark Innovation ETF (ARKK) logged a gain of about 28% for January. 
• A handful of stocks in ARKK's portfolio led the win, including Tesla, Spotify and Roku. 

Cathie Wood's flagship exchange-traded Ark Innovation fund just notched its best month ever as tech stocks like its favored Tesla make a strong comeback.

The famed money manager's Ark Innovation ETF (ARKK) rose 3.7% on Tuesday to deliver an almost 28% gain for January — though it's still down 47% on a year ago. The gain follows two low-performing years for the exchange-traded fund, which dropped 69% in 2022 and 21% in 2021.

The major US equity indexes all logged losses for 2022 as the Federal Reserve's aggressive interest-rate hikes, inflationary pressures and recession concerns weighed on stocks. The tech-heavy Nasdaq fell 33% for the year as investors shunned riskier assets. 

Wood has criticised the Fed for going overboard with its interest-rate campaign, saying the US central bank is making a mistake with its monetary policy and warning it could spark harmful deflation.

Now investors are opening up to tech-heavy bets like ARKK again as inflation cools, which could prompt the Fed to ease up on its interest rate hikes. The Nasdaq itself is up 10.7% since the start of this year.

Wood, who's been a Tesla advocate for years, has loaded up on shares of Elon Musk's automaker in recent weeks, plowing in more than $19 million in January even after the EV maker missed its delivery targets. 

For January, Tesla was the second-best performing stock on the S&P 500 with a 41% monthly rise — a comeback that marks a dramatic U-turn from a nightmarish 2022, when the EV-maker's stock tumbled 64%. But better-than-expected earnings and hopes the Fed will soften its monetary policy have helped fuel the rebound. 

Other stocks in ARKK's portfolio leading the win were Spotify and Roku, respectively up about 43% and 41% year to date.