Topline
SoftBank Group’s shares tumbled sharply on Tuesday, wiping nearly $5 billion from its founder and CEO Masayoshi Son’s fortune, as the enthusiasm over Google’s new Gemini 3 artificial intelligence model raised concerns around the investment giant’s big bet on ChatGPT-maker OpenAI.
SoftBank Group CEO Masayoshi Son’s fortune dropped by $4.9 billion on Tuesday.
Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All rights reserved
Key Facts
SoftBank shares slumped nearly 11% on Tuesday before recovering slightly to ¥15,390 ($98.5), down 9.95% from its previous close.
Tuesday’s slump follows a 10.9% drop in the tech investment giant’s shares on Friday, as the Tokyo Stock Exchange reopened after a long weekend in Japan.
The stock drop comes amid concerns about growing competition facing OpenAI, the company in which Softbank’s Vision Fund has made a massive bet.
Concerns about the ChatGPT maker’s dominance in the AI market have emerged after Google released its new Gemini 3 model, which received glowing reviews.
Earlier this month, the investment giant announced it had sold its entire 32.1 million holding of Nvidia shares in October for $5.83 billion to help fund other key AI bets, including OpenAI.
Forbes Valuation
According to our estimates, Softbank founder and CEO Masayoshi Son’s net worth slumped by $4.9 billion to $49.3 billion on Tuesday as the company’s stock hit its lowest level since mid-September. The billionaire’s rank has now dropped to 32nd on Forbes’ Real Time Billionaires’ list of the world’s richest people. Son, who was Asia’s third richest person at the start of this month, has now dropped to eighth on that list, just below Uniqlo founder and CEO Tadashi Yanai.