SoftBank Shares Slide for Third Consecutive Session After $5.83 Billion Nvidia Divestment

Tokyo — SoftBank Group shares fell sharply on Friday, extending a multi-day decline that began after the company confirmed the complete sale of its Nvidia holdings for $5.83 billion. The stock was down nearly 9% during early trading before trimming losses to about 5% by 9 p.m. ET. Friday’s drop marks the third straight session in negative territory and follows a week in which the Japanese technology conglomerate lost close to $50 billion in market capitalization, its steepest weekly setback since March 2020.

The latest sell-off came less than 24 hours after SoftBank disclosed in its quarterly results that it had disposed of 32.1 million Nvidia shares in October. The transaction formed part of a broader portfolio adjustment that also included a reduction of the company’s stake in U.S. wireless carrier T-Mobile. Combined, the two moves generated proceeds of $9.17 billion.

Senior equity analyst Rolf Bulk of New Street Research attributed Friday’s weakness to wider concerns about semiconductor and technology valuations rather than to company-specific news. According to Bulk, SoftBank’s current trading discount to the net value of its holdings remains relatively narrow compared with historical averages, making a single-day decline of 5% to 6% unsurprising in a downbeat sector environment.

Nvidia Exit Repeats Earlier Pattern

This is not the first time SoftBank has fully exited Nvidia. The firm’s Vision Fund accumulated roughly $4 billion in Nvidia shares during 2017 but sold the position in early 2019. Despite the latest divestment, the two companies remain connected through several artificial-intelligence initiatives that rely on Nvidia hardware. Among them is the $500 billion Stargate data-center project in the United States, a venture in which SoftBank maintains an active role.

Wider Pressure Across Asian Tech Stocks

SoftBank’s decline coincided with broad weakness in semiconductor and technology shares throughout Asia. Japanese chip-equipment suppliers were particularly hard hit: Advantest lost more than 3%, while Tokyo Electron fell over 4%. In Taiwan, contract chip manufacturing giant TSMC slipped 2.04%. South Korea’s SK Hynix retreated in excess of 5%, and Samsung Electronics declined 3.8%.

Chinese internet and e-commerce names also traded lower. Tencent Holdings dropped 5.61%, and JD.com gave up 4.31%. The negative sentiment followed a down session on Wall Street in which Nvidia and Broadcom sank 3.6% and 4.3%, respectively, while Alphabet fell 2.8%.

The synchronized pullback reflects growing caution toward the semiconductor cycle, a trend highlighted in recent forecasts published by the World Semiconductor Trade Statistics organization, which project a year of modest industry growth after significant pandemic-era expansion.

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Market Capitalization and Discount Dynamics

SoftBank entered Friday trading with its share price already under pressure from last week’s steep decline, during which roughly $50 billion in market value was erased. That contraction represented the company’s worst weekly performance since the early months of the COVID-19 pandemic. Analysts monitor the spread between SoftBank’s quoted equity value and the estimated worth of its portfolio holdings—referred to as the conglomerate’s “holding discount.” Although the discount widened during the 2022 technology downturn, recent valuations have placed it near the low end of historical ranges, suggesting investors remain sensitive to additional negative signals.

Portfolio Strategy Amid Volatility

The sale of Nvidia shares and the partial reduction of the T-Mobile stake indicate an ongoing strategy to raise cash and rebalance assets within SoftBank’s diverse investment platform, which spans telecommunications, e-commerce, and artificial intelligence. The Vision Fund, a key component of that platform, has experienced both sizeable gains and losses since its inception, amplifying the impact of major portfolio shifts on SoftBank’s market performance.

While the company has not detailed specific plans for the proceeds, its chairman and CEO, Masayoshi Son, has emphasized a focus on AI-related opportunities. SoftBank’s remaining interests include stakes in Arm Holdings and various startup-stage ventures pursuing applications in machine learning and robotics.

Outlook

SoftBank shares remained volatile throughout Friday’s session, mirroring broader sector moves. Whether the selling pressure persists may depend on investor confidence in the semiconductor demand outlook and on further disclosures concerning SoftBank’s deployment of cash raised from recent asset sales. For now, the company’s share price continues to track the fortunes of global technology markets, reinforcing its exposure to shifts in sentiment toward high-growth, chip-centric businesses.

Crédito da imagem: Issei Kato | Reuters