(Bloomberg) – SoftBank Group Corp. is building stakes in Nvidia Corp. and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co.
Japanese technology investors had increased their NVIDIA stake to around $3 billion by the end of March, according to regulatory filings. I purchased approximately $330 million worth of TSMC shares and $170 million from Oracle Corp.
That's while SoftBank's Signature Vision Fund monetized nearly $2 billion in public and private assets in the first half of 2025, according to those familiar with the fund's activities. Vision Fund prioritizes return on investment and there is no special pressure to monetize assets from SoftBank, said someone who asked not to discuss personal information. A SoftBank representative declined to comment.
At the heart of Softbank's AI Ambitions is Chip Designer Arm Holdings Plc. His son is gradually building a portfolio in Cambridge, a leading industry player based in Cambridge, UK, and is hoping to catch up after losing almost the historic rally that made Nvidia a $4 trillion giant and contracted chip maker TSMC closer to value at $1 trillion.
“Nvidia is a pick and shovel for the AI gold rush,” said Ben Narasin, founder and general partner of Tenacity Venture Capital. Softbank's purchase of shares in the US company could potentially buy more influence and access to Nvidia's most popular chips, he said. “Maybe he can skip the line.”
Softbank, which reports its quarterly revenue on Thursday, should benefit from its bet, at least on paper. Nvidia has increased its market value by around 90% since strolling around early April for the first time in a year, while TSMC has risen by more than 40%.
It helps to make up for missing out on many of Nvidia's post-Chatgpt rally. This is one of the biggest rally ever. Softbank was early on to bet on AI long before Openai's inventive chatbot, but in early 2019 it gave up a 4.9% stake in Nvidia, and today it's worth over $200 billion.
The crippling losses in the Vision Fund also hampered Softbank's ability to become an early investor in generating AI. An attempt to buy back some of the company's NVIDIA shares along with Proxy TSMC's shares will help his son regain access to some of the most advantageous parts of the semiconductor supply chain.
The 67-year-old SoftBank founder now aims to play a more central role in the spread of AI through its sweeping partnership. These include Softbank's $500 billion Stargate Data Center Fakeay Fakead with Openai, Oracle and Abu Dhabi-backed investment fund MGX. The son also courts TSMC and others about joining Arizona's $1 trillion AI manufacturing hub.
According to Richard Kaye, co-head of Comgest Asset Management and longtime SoftBank Investor's Japan Equity Strategy, ARM's intellectual property is used to power most mobile chips and is increasingly used in server chips, SoftBank can open up unique positions rather than the manufacturer itself.
“I think he sees himself as a natural provider of AI semiconductor technology,” he said. “What my son really wants to do is to capture the upstream and all the downstream.”
Investors cheered on his son's bold plans, but analysts say they hope SoftBank will report his swing to net profit in the June quarter. SoftBank shares hit record highs last month. Softbank plans to trade $6.5 billion to acquire US chip company Ampere Computing LLC, and an additional $30 billion investment in Openai is encouraging investors to see stocks as a way to ride the momentum of US startups.
However, according to people close to billionaires, the son remains unhappy. They said his son thinks a large US project could help current AI leaders jump over Softbank to become a trillion dollar or a bigger company.
Stocks continue to trade at a 40% discount on SoftBank's total assets, with a discount of approximately 40%. This includes approximately 90% of the stake in the $148 billion Arm. Softbank's market capitalization is around $119 billion, just a small portion of Nvidia's $4.4 trillion valuation, and is a rating of other high-tech companies that are most closely related to AI's progress.
His son, who had previously hampered and derailed merger plans like the Arm and Nvidia Coalition, has tried to capitalize on his relationship with Donald Trump and has arranged frequent meetings with White House officials. As AI and semiconductors become geopolitical flashpoints, these efforts become important. Softbank's plans to buy Ampere face an investigation by the Federal Trade Commission.
June quarter revenues will focus on other assets that will help SoftBank sell out and help ensure the liquidity needed to double its hardware investments. Japanese companies have raised approximately $4.8 billion so far by selling a portion of their T-Mobile shareholdings in June. Its Chief Financial Officer Yoshimura Goto cited the company's net asset value at the end of March, citing its end of March, stating it has sufficient capital to cover the company's funding needs.
During the business year ended March, Vision Fund exits included Doordash Inc. and View Inc., Cloud Security Company Wiz Inc. and Enterprise Software Startup Peak.
“We're after AI has used a series of startups and group companies,” my son told shareholders in June. “We want to be the number one platformer organizer in the era of artificial superintelligence.”
– Support from Edwin Chan.
More stories like this are available at bloomberg.com
