SoftBank billionaire Son trims share pledges after AI rally

Billionaire Masayoshi Son has reduced the SoftBank Group shares he pledged to lenders by US$2.1 billion (S$2.7 billion) in recent months, lowering his collateral after bets on artificial intelligence (AI) propelled the latest comeback in his volatile technology fortune.

Mr Son, SoftBank’s chief executive, trimmed his committed shares by 19.4 million to around 154.2 million, according to a filing earlier in December. About 31 per cent of his holdings in the Tokyo-listed company are now pledged to banks, down from nearly 39 per cent in March 2020, data compiled by Bloomberg shows.

The bulk of Mr Son’s US$35.3 billion fortune derives from a stake of just over a third in SoftBank, the conglomerate he founded that oversees a global empire of investments from chipmakers to start-up ventures.

SoftBank shares surged almost 200 per cent to peak at the end of October on the back of an AI frenzy. They have given up some of the gains lately on fears of a bubble in the sector, but are still heading for the biggest yearly gain since 2013. 

A Singapore-based investment firm ultimately controlled by Mr Son now holds US$1.1 billion of SoftBank stock, according to the same filing, a departure from the billionaire’s previous management of his shares via Japanese entities.

Mr Son has historically used shares in the group he founded as collateral for loans with lenders, including Mizuho Financial Group, Deutsche Bank and Julius Baer Group, and has frequently transferred shares among the different entities he controls.

A spokesperson for SoftBank declined to comment.

Mr Son has been aggressively expanding his bets, making bold investments in AI hardware companies like Nvidia, which he later offloaded, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, briefly turning him into Japan’s richest person earlier in 2025.

When SoftBank’s stock was trading at around 25,000 yen a share in October, Mr Son probably took “advantage of the value the shares have reached to take them off the pledges”, said Mr Amir Anvarzadeh, a market strategist at Asymmetric Advisors in Singapore.

“But since then, they have been coming under a lot of pressure,” said Mr Anvarzadeh, who recommends clients to short the stock.

Singapore investment firm

Singapore-based SAM Wealth Management borrowed 10 million SoftBank shares, worth about US$1.1 billion, from a Japan-based parent company that is also controlled by the billionaire, according to the Dec 5 filing.

The filing does not detail the rationale behind the stock loan agreement between the two entities, but the transaction is a reminder of the complex web of relationships that have long underpinned one of Japan’s largest and most volatile fortunes.

The Singapore wealth firm was incorporated in 2021 and is fully owned by Son Assets Management, a Japanese entity that holds a 1.9 per cent stake in SoftBank.

Mr Son’s Singapore investment entity is headquartered in the city’s Raffles Place financial district. To fund its operations, it has borrowed from banks, including facilities backed by an aircraft. It did not disclose further details.

“With SoftBank shares up so much this year, there could be an opportunity for him to renegotiate with banks on terms for collaterals on the money that he’s borrowed,” said Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Kirk Boodry, who has covered the Japanese tech firm for more than 15 years. BLOOMBERG