SoftBank Group delivered one of its strongest earnings recoveries in recent years, as aggressive exposure to artificial intelligence investments — particularly OpenAI and Arm — dramatically reshaped the group’s financial performance and balance sheet during fiscal year 2025.
The Japanese technology investment conglomerate reported net income attributable to shareholders of ¥5.0 trillion for the fiscal year ended March 2026, up 334% from the previous year, while income before taxes surged to ¥6.1 trillion. Total investment gains nearly doubled to ¥7.3 trillion.
At the center of the earnings acceleration was SoftBank’s expanding position in OpenAI. The company disclosed that its cumulative investment exposure to OpenAI reached $43.9 billion by year-end, generating a valuation gain of approximately $45 billion.
SoftBank also confirmed a new $30 billion follow-on commitment to OpenAI through Vision Fund 2, structured in tranches throughout 2026 at a pre-money valuation of $730 billion. Upon completion, cumulative investment exposure is expected to reach $64.6 billion.
The scale of the OpenAI gains transformed the performance of SoftBank Vision Fund 2. The segment posted investment gains of ¥6.85 trillion during FY2025, with roughly ¥6.5 trillion directly linked to OpenAI-related appreciation.
The earnings report also highlighted a broader strategic shift toward AI infrastructure and semiconductor exposure. SoftBank recorded gains tied to investments in NVIDIA Corporation and Intel, while continuing to expand holdings connected to AI computing, energy infrastructure, and next-generation data systems.
Meanwhile, Arm Holdings continued to emerge as one of the company’s core assets. SoftBank’s net asset value climbed from ¥25.7 trillion to ¥40.1 trillion during the fiscal year, reaching an all-time high, largely driven by the appreciation of Arm and OpenAI-related assets.
By March 2026, Arm and OpenAI together accounted for approximately 65% of SoftBank’s equity value of holdings, underscoring how concentrated the group’s investment strategy has become around artificial intelligence.
The company simultaneously increased leverage to finance its AI expansion. Total liabilities rose by more than ¥9.2 trillion year-over-year, while interest-bearing debt climbed to ¥24.6 trillion. However, SoftBank said its loan-to-value ratio improved from 18% to 17%, supported by rapid growth in portfolio valuations.
For investors, the results reinforce how aggressively CEO Masayoshi Son is repositioning SoftBank around the global AI ecosystem. The strategy increasingly ties the company’s future performance to the continued expansion of generative AI, semiconductor infrastructure, and hyperscale computing demand.
At the same time, the concentration of value in a limited number of AI-related assets may heighten future volatility, particularly if technology valuations weaken or financing conditions tighten globally.
Still, the latest quarter signals that SoftBank has re-emerged as one of the market’s largest and most leveraged institutional bets on artificial intelligence infrastructure worldwide.
