(Yicai Global) Jan. 12 -- Ark Investment Management, a US firm run by famed fund manager Cathie Wood, dumped almost 890,000 shares of Chinese e-commerce giant JD.Com on Jan. 10, its biggest selloff since last July.

The shares were worth more than USD60 million, based on the closing price that day, Chinese newspaper ChinaFund reported today. Ark's Autonomous Technology and Robotics ETF sold about 620,000, while its Fintech Innovation ETF offloaded 270,000.

Ark has been cutting its holdings in JD.Com since mid-September last year. It still owns 2.4 million of the Beijing-based online retailer’s stock.

Ark had bought JD.Com shares between late August and early September, buying 160,000 on Aug. 23 and another 120,000 on Sept. 2. The purchases came when market sentiment was relatively optimistic, with JD.Com's second-quarter results having outperformed expectations.

At the time, Wood said one of the reasons behind Ark's long position was that JD.Com does not have a monopoly in the e-commerce sector and was therefore less at risk from China's moves to rein in dominant tech giants.

But the picture has darkened since then. Tencent Holdings has been under pressure from regulators to reduce its influence, with the company announcing on Dec. 23 that it would give away 460 million shares in JD.Com, worth over USD16 billion, as a one-time dividend to investors. That also had the effect of attracting fewer visitors to JD.Com from apps operated by Tencent and Tencent-backed firms.

The minutes of the US Federal Reserve's December meeting, published on the morning of Jan. 6 Beijing time, also rattled the market as they were more hawkish than expected, hinting at rate rises to control inflation. That led to tech stocks being dumped by hedge funds.

Shares of JD.Com [NASDAQ: JD] closed up 10.3 percent at USD76.76 each in New York yesterday following Ark's selloff.

Editor: Tom Litting