SoftBank builds Nvidia, TSMC stakes under Masayoshi Son's focus on AI gear
The Japanese technology investor raised its stake in Nvidia to about $3 billion by the end of March, up from $1 billion in the prior quarter, according to regulatory filings. It bought around $330 million worth of TSMC shares and $170 million in Oracle Corp., they show.
That's while SoftBank's signature Vision Fund has monetized almost $2 billion of public and private assets in the first half of 2025, according to a person familiar with the fund's activities. The Vision Fund prioritizes its returns on investment and there is no particular pressure from SoftBank to monetize its assets, said the person, who asked not to be named discussing private information. A representative of SoftBank declined to comment.
At the heart of SoftBank's AI ambitions is chip designer Arm Holdings Plc. Son is gradually building a portfolio around the Cambridge, UK-based company with key industry players, seeking to catch up after largely missing a historic rally that's made Nvidia into a $4 trillion behemoth and boosted its contract chipmaker TSMC near a $1 trillion value. 'Nvidia is the picks and shovels for the gold rush of AI,' said Ben Narasin, founder and general partner of Tenacity Venture Capital, referring to a concerted effort by the world's largest technology companies to spend hundreds of billions of dollars to get ahead. SoftBank's purchase of the US company's stock may buy more influence and access to Nvidia's most sought-after chips, he said. 'Maybe he gets to skip the line.'SoftBank, which reports quarterly earnings Thursday, should've benefited from that bet on Nvidia — at least on paper. Nvidia has gained around 90% in market value since hitting a year's low around early April, while TSMC has climbed over 40%.That's helping to make up for missing out on much of Nvidia's post-ChatGPT rally — one of the biggest of all time. SoftBank, which was early to start betting on betting on AI long before OpenAI's seminal chatbot, parted with a 4.9% stake in Nvidia in early 2019 that would be worth more than $200 billion today.
Crippling losses at the Vision Fund also hampered SoftBank's ability to be an early investor in generative AI. The company's attempts to buy back some Nvidia shares, alongside those of proxy TSMC, would help Son regain access to some of the most lucrative parts of the semiconductor supply chain. The 67-year-old SoftBank founder now seeks to play a more central role in the spread of AI through sweeping partnerships. These include SoftBank's $500 billion Stargate data center foray with OpenAI, Oracle and Abu Dhabi-backed investment fund MGX. Son is also courting TSMC and others about taking part in a $1 trillion AI manufacturing hub in Arizona.As Arm's intellectual property is used to power the majority of mobile chips and is increasingly used in server chips, SoftBank could carve out a unique position without being a manufacturer itself, according to Richard Kaye, co-head of Japan equity strategy at Comgest Asset Management and a long-time SoftBank investor.'I think he sees himself as the natural provider of AI semiconductor technology,' he said. 'What Son really wants to do is capture the upstream and the downstream of everything.'Investors have cheered Son's audacious plans, while analysts say they expect SoftBank to report a swing back to a net income in the June quarter. SoftBank shares marked a record high last month. SoftBank's planned $6.5 billion deal to acquire US chip firm Ampere Computing LLC and another $30 billion investment in OpenAI are further encouraging investors who see the stock as a way to ride the US startup's momentum.Son, however, remains dissatisfied, according to people close to the billionaire. Son sees the big projects in the US as having the potential to help SoftBank leapfrog the current leaders in AI to become a trillion-dollar or bigger company, they said.The stock continues to trade at a roughly estimated 40% discount to SoftBank's total assets — which includes a roughly 90% stake in the $148 billion-valued Arm. SoftBank's market capitalization stands at around $119 billion, a fraction of Nvidia's $4.4 trillion valuation and that of other tech companies most closely associated with AI progress. Son, who in the past has seen Washington hamper or derail merger plans like the union of Arm and Nvidia, seeks to leverage his relationship with Donald Trump and is arranging frequent meetings with White House officials. Those efforts are now critical as AI and semiconductors become geopolitical flash points. SoftBank's plan to buy Ampere is facing a probe by the Federal Trade Commission. Attention at its June quarter earnings will be on what other assets SoftBank might sell down to help it secure the liquidity it needs to double down on hardware investments. The Japanese company has so far raised around $4.8 billion through a sale of some of its T-Mobile share holding in June. Its Chief Financial Officer Yoshimitsu Goto has cited the company's end-March net asset value of ¥25.7 trillion ($175 billion), saying the company has ample capital to cover its funding needs.In the business year ended March, the Vision Fund's exits included DoorDash Inc. and View Inc., as well as cloud security company Wiz Inc. and enterprise software startup Peak, even as SoftBank bought up the stakes in Nvidia, TSMC and Oracle. 'We're after AI using an array of startups and group companies,' Son told shareholders in June. 'We want to become the organizer of the No. 1 platformer in the artificial super intelligence era.' Elevate your knowledge and leadership skills at a cost cheaper than your daily tea. Can Coforge's ambition to lead the IT Industry become a reality?
BlackRock returns, this time with Ambani. Will it be lucky second time?
Amazon is making stealthy moves in healthcare, here's why!
The trader who blew the whistle on Jane Street
Stock Radar: Globus Spirits breaks out from 9-month consolidation; check target & stop loss for long positions
Weekly Top Picks: These stocks scored 10 on 10 on Stock Reports Plus
These large-caps have 'strong buy' & 'buy' recos and an upside potential of more than 25%
Stock picks of the week: 5 stocks with consistent score improvement and upside potential of up to 36% in 1 year
Hashtags
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
&w=3840&q=100)
Business Standard
22 minutes ago
- Business Standard
India's quasi-sovereign wealth fund seeks to double assets to $10 bn
The move comes as the likes of KKR & Co., Brookfield Asset Management Ltd. and GIC Pte are pumping in hundreds of millions of dollars to develop the country's roads, renewable energy projects Bloomberg India's $4.9 billion quasi-sovereign wealth fund is seeking to double its assets under management to $10 billion within the next 30 months, fueled by surging demand for urban infrastructure in the world's fastest-growing major economy. Mumbai-based National Investment & Infrastructure Fund, backed by the Indian government alongside global investors such as Temasek Holdings Pte, Abu Dhabi Investment Authority and AustralianSuper Pty, is capitalising on a big funding gap in the sector, according to Vinod Giri, managing partner for its infrastructure fund. 'We are seeing significant amount of investment requirements — almost double of what we have been seeing over the last five to seven years, across subsectors,' said Giri, who heads NIIF's flagship infrastructure fund labelled the Master Fund. The move comes as the likes of KKR & Co., Brookfield Asset Management Ltd. and GIC Pte are pumping in hundreds of millions of dollars to develop the country's roads, renewable energy projects, telecom towers, warehouses and data centers. Prime Minister Narendra Modi faces pressure to upgrade India's inadequate infrastructure and match the country's aesthetics to its ambitions - or in his words, create 'several Singapores' in the nation. Yet long delays, bad contracts and high costs remain big challenges. Created with much fanfare in 2015 under Modi's administration, NIIF marks the country's first big attempt to develop a capital-raising structure on home soil even as many sovereign entities make direct investments in India. The fund also counts local investors among its backers. NIIF, which currently has assets across its four strategies of infrastructure, climate, private markets and growth equity — is now raising $4.5 billion across successor funds for infrastructure and private markets, Giri said, adding that the firm is seeking to close it in three years. Giri said NIIF anticipates most of its existing investors from the first fund to return to its second one for which it expects to mark the first close by early 2026. Funds typically start investing after raising a portion of the targeted corpus as part of the first close. For the second infrastructure fund, Giri expects a new set of investors from Australia, Japan, US, Europe and Korea. NIIF's recent successful stake sales are likely to support the fundraising attempts, Giri said. NIIF sold its renewable platform in February. It has also disposed three out of five of its road assets in June. The fund achieved a distribution to paid-in capital of 50% with its two exits, said Giri, adding that it means 'for every dollar that our investors have given us till now, we managed to return half of that back to them.'
Economic Times
22 minutes ago
- Economic Times
xAI cofounder Igor Babuschkin departs to launch AI safety investment firm
ETtech Igor Babuschkin, a cofounder of Elon Musk's artificial intelligence startup xAI, said on Wednesday that he has left the company and plans to launch an investment firm focused on AI safety research. Musk launched xAI in 2023 to challenge Big Tech's AI push, accusing industry leaders of excessive censorship and lax safety standards. "Today was my last day at xAI," Babuschkin said in a post on X, adding that his new venture, Babuschkin Ventures, will back AI safety research and startups developing the technology. Babuschkin, who previously worked at Google's DeepMind and OpenAI, described xAI's early scramble to build infrastructure and models, saying he created "many of the foundational tools" for launching and managing training jobs before later overseeing engineering across infrastructure, product and applied AI projects. His departure follows that of xAI's legal head, Robert Keele, earlier this month, and comes amid intensifying competition among AI players such as OpenAI, Google and Anthropic, which are pouring resources into training and deploying advanced systems. Last month, Musk-owned X's CEO Linda Yaccarino also resigned, just months after the platform was folded into xAI. Musk is separately contending with executive departures at Tesla. Elevate your knowledge and leadership skills at a cost cheaper than your daily tea. Tariffs, tantrums, and tech: How Trump's trade drama is keeping Indian IT on tenterhooks Good, bad, ugly: How will higher ethanol in petrol play out for you? As big fat Indian wedding slims to budget, Manyavar loses lustre As 50% US tariff looms, 6 key steps that can safeguard Indian economy Stock Radar: JSPL forms Ascending Triangle pattern on weekly charts, could hit fresh 52-week high soon Nifty and business are different species: 5 small-cap stocks from different sectors with upside potential of up to 30% F&O Radar | Deploy Bear Put Spread in Nifty to play index's negative stance amid volatility Wealth creation: Look beyond the obvious in some things; 10 fertilizer sector companies worth watching
&w=3840&q=100)
First Post
22 minutes ago
- First Post
Trump signs new order easing regulations for private space industry
The change could well benefit Musk, who has long advocated for deregulation of the space industry. The world's richest man was previously a close advisor to Trump before the pair had a dramatic, public falling out in July US President Donald Trump signed an executive order Wednesday easing regulations for the private space industry, including eliminating some environmental reviews, in a move likely to please his erstwhile advisor Elon Musk. The executive order, which said it aimed to 'substantially' increase the number of space launches in the United States, was described by an environmental group as 'reckless.'Since returning to the White House in January, Trump has talked up several space missions including sending humans to the Moon and Mars. The Moon and Mars missions are planned to get a ride on the massive Starship rocket of Musk's private firm SpaceX. However, Starship has had a series of setbacks, with its latest routine test ending in a fiery explosion in June. SpaceX dominates the global launch market, with its various-sized rockets blasting off more than 130 times last year – and that number looks set to rise after Trump's executive order. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD 'It is the policy of the United States to enhance American greatness in space by enabling a competitive launch marketplace and substantially increasing commercial space launch cadence' by 2030, the order read. The change could well benefit Musk, who has long advocated for deregulation of the space industry. The world's richest man was previously a close advisor to Trump before the pair had a dramatic, public falling out in July. The executive order also called on Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy – who was at the signing and is currently NASA's administrator – 'to eliminate or expedite the Department of Transportation's environmental reviews' for launches. SpaceX has been repeatedly criticized over the environmental impact at the sites where Starship, the largest and most powerful rocket in history, blasts off. The US-based nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity said Trump's new executive order 'paves the way for the massive destruction of protected plants and animals.' 'This reckless order puts people and wildlife at risk from private companies launching giant rockets that often explode and wreak devastation on surrounding areas,' the center's Jared Margolis said in a statement. Musk's dreams of colonizing Mars rely on the success of Starship, and SpaceX has been betting that its 'fail fast, learn fast' ethos will eventually pay off. STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD The Federal Aviation Administration approved an increase in annual Starship rocket launches from five to 25 in early May, stating that the increased frequency would not adversely affect the environment.
