SoftBank Group swung to a quarterly profit, riding on gains from its bets on Nvidia and startups in a boon for founder Masayoshi Son's bets on artificial intelligence technologies. A recovery at SoftBank's signature Vision Fund and the sale of assets such as its T-Mobile U.S. holdings are helping Son double down on bets geared to help him capitalize on booming investment in AI hardware. SoftBank, which had sold 4.8 billion worth of its stake in the U.S. telecom company in June, on Thursday revealed the sale of another 3 billion of the U.S. carrier's stock. The Tokyo-based company reported net income of 421.82 billion ( 2.9 billion) in its fiscal first quarter, more than double the average of analyst estimates. The Vision Fund logged a 451.39 billion profit, helped by a recovery in tech valuations and gains on holdings such as Coupang, Auto1 Group SE, Symbotic and Swiggy.

SoftBank Group founder Masayoshi Son declared he will get off the sidelines and go back on the offensive in tech investing soon, seeking to establish his credentials in the burgeoning field of artificial intelligence. The billionaire is ending years of relative dormancy after his Vision Fund, the world's largest pool of tech capital, racked up billions of dollars of losses as a COVID-era internet boom withered and a global economic downturn sapped valuations. The Vision Fund's return to the field is welcome news for a startup ecosystem whose largest players from Uber Technologies to Coupang scaled up thanks to steady financing from the Japanese firm. SoftBank's signature portfolio firm is now Arm, the British chip designer Son argues is central to AI. Arm is now on track for one of the largest initial public offerings this year. This could be due to a conflict with your ad-blocking or security software.

SoftBank Group Corp.-backed Light is struggling to raise funds after the world's largest tech investor balked at putting more money into the startup, people familiar with the matter said. SoftBank owns about 30% of Light through its first Vision Fund, which led an injection of $121 million (¥15.4 billion) into the advanced camera developer in 2018. SoftBank's continued support is critical for the cash-strapped startup, which had been spending millions of dollars to expand into self-driving tech at SoftBank's urging. Hurt by plunging tech valuations, SoftBank is walking away from some of its loss-making portfolio firms to comply with stricter investment criteria, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the matter was not public. Many of the two Vision Funds' portfolio of 300-plus companies are loss-making.

General Motors Co. bought out the SoftBank Vision Fund 1's stake in self-driving startup Cruise LLC for $2.1 billion, ending the Japanese investment firm's involvement in the business and giving the Detroit automaker 80% ownership. GM also said Friday it will invest another $1.35 billion in Cruise, which makes up for the amount that SoftBank had pledged to invest in the startup once the company deploys vehicles in a ride-sharing business, something it is preparing to do. The deal consolidates GM's ownership and control over Cruise, and reverses a capital diversification play by former Chief Executive Officer Dan Ammann, who was fired in December after pushing for an initial public offering. GM CEO Mary Barra and Cruise founder Kyle Vogt, who replaced Ammann as CEO, have said an IPO isn't in the offing at this time and likely won't be anytime soon. "Why not just go public? It's a major distraction, especially right now," Vogt said on Twitter after GM announced the deal.

Founded in 2016 by its chief executive, Marcus Hyung-Sik Kim, the Seoul-based firm plans to use the investment to further its expansion into the U.S. and other key markets, said Robert Nestor, Qraft's U.S. CEO. The companies declined to disclose Qraft's valuation. Tokyo's SoftBank is one of the world's largest investors in technology companies, with its Vision Fund and a successor managing a portfolio of more than $100 billion. Asset managers, once skeptical of the value of AI and mindful of their staffs' concerns that the programs would replace human stock- and bond-pickers, are now looking to add data-analysis tools that can help them combat chronic underperformance and justify the fees they charge investors. The industry's awakening has triggered an arms race to hire the programmers who can develop those tools and spot the market signals hidden in the data.

Masayoshi Son has sharply accelerated the pace of his startup investments this year, quintupling the number of companies in his Vision Fund 2 portfolio in less than nine months. The founder of SoftBank Group Corp. has cut 115 deals this year, according to Bloomberg calculations based on data released by the company. That is more than the combined number of deals the first Vision Fund made since its start in 2017, showing Son remains confident in his investing capability despite blunders with office-sharing service WeWork and financier Greensill. The faster pace of deal-making is sure to raise questions about whether Son is risking similar missteps, especially as a string of high-profile departures depletes top talent at the Vision Fund. Seven managing partners have left since March of last year, and last week Deep Nishar, the sole senior managing partner and leading authority on AI, said he would depart by the end of the year.

Masayoshi Son said he would begin to make personal investments alongside SoftBank Group Corp.'s Vision Fund, a controversial step that could lead to conflicts of interest as his company backs technology startups. The Japanese billionaire made the disclosure as his company reported earnings, explaining he will begin to co-invest in Vision Fund 2, an investment vehicle where SoftBank has been the sole source of capital. Son can invest up to $2.6 billion and will own 17.25% of the equity. He will have a similar arrangement with SoftBank's Latin America fund. Business leaders tend to avoid mixing their personal financial interests with corporate responsibilities.

SoftBank Group Corp. has reported a record profit in its Vision Fund as a surging stock market lifted the value of its portfolio companies, but founder Masayoshi Son wiped out a significant chunk of those gains with his controversial trading in derivatives. The Vision Fund on Monday reported a ¥844.1 billion ($8 billion) profit in the December quarter, surpassing record numbers set just a quarter earlier. A global rally in technology shares has boosted the value of SoftBank's stakes in publicly traded firms like Uber Technologies Inc. and paved the way for initial public offerings from the likes of DoorDash Inc. Those gains, which had been widely expected, were offset by fallout from Son's decision last year to start dabbling in trading stocks and options. SoftBank posted a ¥285.3 billion derivatives loss in the period.

CBS MarketWatch declared 2020: The Year of the SPAC (Special Purpose Acquisition Corporation). A record 219 companies went public through this fundraising vehicle that uses a reverse merger with an existing private business to create a publicly-listed entity. This accounted for more than $73 billion dollars of investment, providing private equity startups a new outlet to raise capital and provide shareholder liquidity. According to Goldman Sachs, the current trends represents a "year-over-year jump of 462% and outpacing traditional IPOs by $6 billion." In response to the interest in SPACs, the Securities and Exchange Commission agreed last week to allow private companies to raise capital through direct listings, providing even more access to the public markets outside of Wall Street's traditional institutional gatekeepers.

In recent news, Boston Dynamics was sold by Softbank to Hyundai at a valuation of $1.1 billion with the latter acquiring 80% stake in the company. Pioneered in developing mobile robots, Boston Dynamics produces some of the most agile and intelligent service and logistics robots. It became famous with its signature product SPOT, which could navigate terrains with unprecedented mobility, allowing it to automate some of the toughest robotics challenges. The company was founded by an MIT professor in 1992. Initially, it was sold to Google at $500 million in 2013, however later to be bought by SoftBank in 2017 for an undisclosed price. While the company was not profitable, it recently gained fame because of its robotic designs.