Koki Nagahama
SoftBank Group (OTCPK:SFTBY) founder Masayoshi Son regrets selling Nvidia (NASDAQ:NVDA) shares five years ago, before the chip giant rode the artificial intelligence wave to become one of the world’s most valuable companies.
Son, who has made some of the most successful tech investments in recent times, at SoftBank’s (OTCPK:SFTBY) annual shareholder meeting said it’s “frustrating to remember the ones I missed,” as quoted by the Wall Street Journal.
The company’s Vision Fund sold its entire 4.9% stake in Nvidia (NVDA) in early 2019, recording a return of $3.3B. “I had to tearfully sell the shares,” he said, as the venture capital fund felt it was time to cash out. “The fish that got away was big.”
SoftBank’s (OTCPK:SFTBY) move appeared to be a big win at the time, as it’d bought the stake for about $700M.
But Nvidia (NVDA) shares have shot up in value in recent years, amid skyrocketing demand for its advanced AI chips. The chipmaker briefly became the world’s most valuable company on Tuesday, but its shares have since pared gains. Its market capitalization is now $3.22T, behind Microsoft’s (MSFT) $3.31T.
If Vision Fund held on to its Nvidia (NVDA) stake, it would’ve been worth around $160B at current prices.
British chipmaker Arm (ARM), in which SoftBank (OTCPK:SFTBY) owns about 90%, is now the Japanese investment giant’s biggest asset, with a market value of $168.46B.
Son said he now wants to help usher in artificial superintelligence, which would be 10,000 times smarter than human intelligence. “SoftBank (OTCPK:SFTBY) has done many things until now that have all been a warm-up for my great dream to realize artificial superintelligence.”
