SoftBank has reported its financial results for the fourth quarter of December 2023, and it has turned a profit for the first time after several consecutive quarters of losses. The net profit stood at 950 billion yen from a total revenue of 1.77 trillion yen.
The majority of SoftBank’s profit this quarter comes from the earnings of its Vision Fund, which recorded a profit of 600 billion yen. In addition, there was also a profit recorded from Arm, which went public in September and saw its stock price increase throughout the period.
Yoshimitsu Goto, the CEO of SoftBank, mentioned during the earnings announcement that the investment focus of the company has shifted from Alibaba to AI. The current value of the investment in Alibaba represents only 0.02% of the total investment, while greater emphasis has been placed on Arm, which is considered the heart of AI, and other companies in the Vision Fund that are AI-focused. As a result of this shift, SoftBank’s investments in China have decreased from 54% to just 8%.
In the previous quarter, notable investments from Vision Fund 2 included Tractable, a platform for assessing car damages through AI-enabled image processing, and Cato Networks, a company developing Secure Access Service Edge (SASE) technology for enterprise security.
TLDR: SoftBank has reported a reversal of fortunes with a net profit of 950 billion yen in the fourth quarter of December 2023. The majority of the profit came from the Vision Fund’s earnings, while emphasis on AI investments led to a reduced focus on Alibaba. Notable investments included Tractable and Cato Networks.
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