SoftBank Chairman Masayoshi Son "Like Jesus"... Leadership Shaken Amid Worst Performance

Chairman Son: "Jesus Christ was misunderstood but will be re-evaluated in the future"

Announces plan to secure liquidity through asset sales

▲Masayoshi Son, Chairman of SoftBank [Image source=EPA Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Kwon Jaehee] "I feel like I have become Jesus Christ."

Son Jeong-ui, Chairman of Japan's SoftBank Group, said this on the 18th, the day after announcing the worst performance, defending his investment strategy.

After SoftBank recorded its largest-ever loss of 961.5 billion yen (approximately 11.064 trillion KRW) for the fiscal year 2019 (April 2019 to March 2020), investors questioned Chairman Son's investment approach. He responded, "Jesus was also misunderstood and criticized in many ways, but wasn't he re-evaluated later?" He explained that if future investments and financial conditions improve, he would regain his reputation and standing.

Even considering the special circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic, this SoftBank performance is a painful point for Chairman Son. The failure of investments through the 10 trillion yen Vision Fund led by Son had a significant impact. In particular, the transportation sector, which accounts for about 4% of the Vision Fund's investment scale, saw demand plummet due to movement restrictions caused by COVID-19. Uber Technologies in the U.S., invested in by the Vision Fund, is estimated to have suffered a provisional loss of 4.3 billion dollars. The shared office company WeWork also recorded a loss of 5.3 billion dollars.

Chairman Son stated, "We will sell assets to secure cash," showing a desperate effort to secure liquidity. Since external financing has become difficult due to investment failures, SoftBank plans to secure a total of 4.5 trillion yen (approximately 51.23 trillion KRW) to respond to the stock price plunge and financial deterioration caused by COVID-19. The main purposes are share buybacks and using debt reserves.

To this end, SoftBank is reportedly discussing selling part of its 25% stake in the U.S. telecommunications company T-Mobile to Germany's Deutsche Telekom. Entering the U.S. telecommunications market has been Chairman Son's lifelong ambition, but he boldly abandoned this attachment amid the cash liquidity crisis. SoftBank also decided not to pay dividends for the first time since its listing in 1994.

Chairman Son expressed his intention to continue investing in promising fields. Representative examples include 'Didi Chuxing,' known as the Uber of China, and the Chinese tech company 'ByteDance.' Son said, "I want to continue new investments within reasonable limits," pledging to persevere and recover.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.