SoftBank to stop investing 'randomly' after losing billions of dollars
(2022/05/13)
- Reference: 1652393981
- News link: https://www.theregister.co.uk/2022/05/12/softbanks_tech_loss/
- Source link:
SoftBank lost a lot of money over the past 12 months.
The Japanese giant's founder and CEO Masayoshi Son today [1]told analysts on a conference call marking the end of its [2]fiscal 2022 year that the SoftBank group as a whole lost $13.15 billion. Its two Vision Funds, which account for 50 percent of SoftBank's net asset value, alone lost $27.4 billion between them. If your technology stock or cryptocurrency portfolio has taken a dive lately in these bumpy economic times, perhaps you can manage a wry grin here.
On the bright side, Son said Arm and SoftBank had managed to put an end to the drama at [3]Arm China , or at least enter the final chapter of that saga. Meanwhile, Arm's revenues for the 12-month period were up 35 percent on the previous year, totaling $2.7 billion. Arm said in its [4]earnings release that it shipped a record number of chips in calendar 2021 as well: 29.2 billion. SoftBank Group owns 75 percent of Arm; the Vision Fund owns the remainder.
[5]
Son also said the brouhaha at Arm China was the last thing standing in the way of an Arm IPO. "There's no reason for Arm [not to go] public. So going forward, we will proceed with procedures of Arm's IPO," Son said, adding that Softbank would have a majority stake in a public Arm.
[6]
[7]
The Vision Funds are the side of the business through which SoftBank has invested in DoorDash, Alibaba, WeWork, Nvidia, Uber, TikTok owner ByteDance, and more. Many of the companies in the Vision Fund's investment list have faced trouble due to US sanctions on China, further harming their opportunities for growth. Indeed, Son blamed COVID-19 and the Russian invasion of Ukraine for much of the problems it, and the rest of the world, are facing, as those global events have led to corresponding rises in [8]inflation and interest rates.
In response, Son said SoftBank plans to tighten its belt and enter a defensive mode that he said will be characterized by two things: continued monetization, and stricter investment criteria.
[9]Fortunate Son: SoftBank chief took 50 per cent pay cut in 2020, but that's not the worst of his worries
[10]SoftBank likens itself to a goose laying 'golden eggs' as Vision Fund boasts best results since 2017
[11]Uber, Meta to reduce hiring as stocks slide
[12]Alibaba's Jack Ma bails from SoftBank's board
[13]Second-wave dotcom Uber-investor SoftBank forecasts gargantuan losses as world economy faces slump
Those two go hand in hand, as Son described it. He said the Vision Fund group would slow its pace, stop "making new investments randomly," and keep plenty of cash on hand. The company will also top up its coffers by selling its positions in private companies after IPOs to better "monetize" its industry moves, and reinvest gains. Son said the Vision Fund may decrease its startup investments by 50 to 75 percent over the coming year.
The SoftBank canary may be wobbling on its perch, though it's not the first indicator of trouble in the technology-sector coal mine: to name two, Uber and Meta [14]both reported financial turbulence lately, and a drive to cut costs and hiring, while their stocks have slid by 46 and 40 percent, respectively, in the past six months.
[15]
Big-name [16]personal-tech-related outfits that saw explosive growth during the pandemic have been badly hit, the Washington Post [17]noted , with Peloton, Netflix, and Amazon all facing stock selloffs. Cryptocurrency prices have also plummeted amid concerns over increased regulations among other effects. ®
Get our [18]Tech Resources
[1] https://seekingalpha.com/article/4510606-softbank-group-corp-sftby-ceo-masayoshi-son-on-q4-2022-results-earnings-call-transcript
[2] https://group.softbank/en/ir/presentations?year=2021&all=on#202205120000
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/03/arm_china_staff_protest/
[4] https://www.arm.com/company/news/2022/05/arm-delivers-record-revenues-and-record-profits-in-fy21
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2Yn3X46qiMYj3hUVbFYyvhgAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Yn3X46qiMYj3hUVbFYyvhgAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Yn3X46qiMYj3hUVbFYyvhgAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2022/02/18/it_inflation/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2021/05/27/softbank/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2021/02/08/softbank_vision_fund/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/10/uber_meta_employment_stocks/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2020/05/18/jack_ma_resigns_frm_softbank_board/
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2020/04/14/secondwave_dotcom_uberinvestor_softbank_forecasts/
[14] https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/10/uber_meta_employment_stocks/
[15] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Yn3X46qiMYj3hUVbFYyvhgAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/13/coinbase_ceo_assets/
[17] https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/05/09/markets-inflation-china-fed-russia/
[18] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
The Japanese giant's founder and CEO Masayoshi Son today [1]told analysts on a conference call marking the end of its [2]fiscal 2022 year that the SoftBank group as a whole lost $13.15 billion. Its two Vision Funds, which account for 50 percent of SoftBank's net asset value, alone lost $27.4 billion between them. If your technology stock or cryptocurrency portfolio has taken a dive lately in these bumpy economic times, perhaps you can manage a wry grin here.
On the bright side, Son said Arm and SoftBank had managed to put an end to the drama at [3]Arm China , or at least enter the final chapter of that saga. Meanwhile, Arm's revenues for the 12-month period were up 35 percent on the previous year, totaling $2.7 billion. Arm said in its [4]earnings release that it shipped a record number of chips in calendar 2021 as well: 29.2 billion. SoftBank Group owns 75 percent of Arm; the Vision Fund owns the remainder.
[5]
Son also said the brouhaha at Arm China was the last thing standing in the way of an Arm IPO. "There's no reason for Arm [not to go] public. So going forward, we will proceed with procedures of Arm's IPO," Son said, adding that Softbank would have a majority stake in a public Arm.
[6]
[7]
The Vision Funds are the side of the business through which SoftBank has invested in DoorDash, Alibaba, WeWork, Nvidia, Uber, TikTok owner ByteDance, and more. Many of the companies in the Vision Fund's investment list have faced trouble due to US sanctions on China, further harming their opportunities for growth. Indeed, Son blamed COVID-19 and the Russian invasion of Ukraine for much of the problems it, and the rest of the world, are facing, as those global events have led to corresponding rises in [8]inflation and interest rates.
In response, Son said SoftBank plans to tighten its belt and enter a defensive mode that he said will be characterized by two things: continued monetization, and stricter investment criteria.
[9]Fortunate Son: SoftBank chief took 50 per cent pay cut in 2020, but that's not the worst of his worries
[10]SoftBank likens itself to a goose laying 'golden eggs' as Vision Fund boasts best results since 2017
[11]Uber, Meta to reduce hiring as stocks slide
[12]Alibaba's Jack Ma bails from SoftBank's board
[13]Second-wave dotcom Uber-investor SoftBank forecasts gargantuan losses as world economy faces slump
Those two go hand in hand, as Son described it. He said the Vision Fund group would slow its pace, stop "making new investments randomly," and keep plenty of cash on hand. The company will also top up its coffers by selling its positions in private companies after IPOs to better "monetize" its industry moves, and reinvest gains. Son said the Vision Fund may decrease its startup investments by 50 to 75 percent over the coming year.
The SoftBank canary may be wobbling on its perch, though it's not the first indicator of trouble in the technology-sector coal mine: to name two, Uber and Meta [14]both reported financial turbulence lately, and a drive to cut costs and hiring, while their stocks have slid by 46 and 40 percent, respectively, in the past six months.
[15]
Big-name [16]personal-tech-related outfits that saw explosive growth during the pandemic have been badly hit, the Washington Post [17]noted , with Peloton, Netflix, and Amazon all facing stock selloffs. Cryptocurrency prices have also plummeted amid concerns over increased regulations among other effects. ®
Get our [18]Tech Resources
[1] https://seekingalpha.com/article/4510606-softbank-group-corp-sftby-ceo-masayoshi-son-on-q4-2022-results-earnings-call-transcript
[2] https://group.softbank/en/ir/presentations?year=2021&all=on#202205120000
[3] https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/03/arm_china_staff_protest/
[4] https://www.arm.com/company/news/2022/05/arm-delivers-record-revenues-and-record-profits-in-fy21
[5] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=2&c=2Yn3X46qiMYj3hUVbFYyvhgAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D2%26raptor%3Dcondor%26pos%3Dtop%26test%3D0
[6] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Yn3X46qiMYj3hUVbFYyvhgAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[7] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=3&c=33Yn3X46qiMYj3hUVbFYyvhgAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D3%26raptor%3Deagle%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[8] https://www.theregister.com/2022/02/18/it_inflation/
[9] https://www.theregister.com/2021/05/27/softbank/
[10] https://www.theregister.com/2021/02/08/softbank_vision_fund/
[11] https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/10/uber_meta_employment_stocks/
[12] https://www.theregister.com/2020/05/18/jack_ma_resigns_frm_softbank_board/
[13] https://www.theregister.com/2020/04/14/secondwave_dotcom_uberinvestor_softbank_forecasts/
[14] https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/10/uber_meta_employment_stocks/
[15] https://pubads.g.doubleclick.net/gampad/jump?co=1&iu=/6978/reg_onprem/front&sz=300x50%7C300x100%7C300x250%7C300x251%7C300x252%7C300x600%7C300x601&tile=4&c=44Yn3X46qiMYj3hUVbFYyvhgAAAIk&t=ct%3Dns%26unitnum%3D4%26raptor%3Dfalcon%26pos%3Dmid%26test%3D0
[16] https://www.theregister.com/2022/05/13/coinbase_ceo_assets/
[17] https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2022/05/09/markets-inflation-china-fed-russia/
[18] https://whitepapers.theregister.com/
tomgid
The only business that actually has substantial value, apart from the other techy startups the SoftBank Group has invested of which many of them haven't even reached the summit of the burning phase, and generate cash flow from outside Japan now carries meaning more than as a mere investment portfolio.
They're not going to surrender their shares in ARM so easily from now on as it became the girder of the fragile bloated group. Mismanagement will continue. Such a great misfortune for the semiconductor industry.
Its always been about quality....
When to governments keep on giving away money it hard to lose. But when the printing presses stop the money heads for quality.