SoftBank Group Corp.’s stock rose 1.5% to a new lifetime high on Wednesday, a vote of confidence in Masayoshi Son’s ambitions to ramp up investments in AI and semiconductors.
The Japanese tech investor is gaining investor attention as its telecom arm moves aggressively to invest in generative AI, tying up with Microsoft Corp. and startup Perplexity AI Inc. and building data centers stocked with Nvidia Corp. accelerators.
The rally is a vindication for SoftBank founder Son, whose reputation has been tarnished by big startup bets that cost the company billions of dollars in recent years. SoftBank’s close ties with Nvidia and OpenAI have strengthened the company’s position amid a global race to build AI-related infrastructure.
Shares of SoftBank got a lift in part because the benchmark Nikkei 225’s recovery is expected to help the investment firm’s earnings, according to Tomoaki Kawasaki, a senior analyst at Iwaicosmo Securities.
“It’s getting another boost as more investors see it as a semiconductor-related stock,” he said.
A darling of retail investors, SoftBank shares remain volatile. During the dot-com boom and bust, the company lost 99% of its market capitalization, erasing $70 billion of Son’s wealth. Its stock regained ground through two decades of effort rolling out broadband networks in Japan, selling the country’s first Apple Inc. iPhones and investments in some of the world’s biggest startups.
But its shares plunged again in 2021 in the wake of Beijing’s crackdown on tech firms and a flurry of missteps including investments in startups such as WeWork, Katerra Inc., OneWeb Ltd. and Zume Pizza Inc.
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