Sale of T-Mobile shares will allow SoftBank to increase its investments in AI
The Japanese investment group SoftBank is stepping up its efforts in AI development. This is evident in the sale of shares in the telecommunications company T-Mobile. The corporation plans to invest the US$4.8 billion proceeds in innovative technologies.
Prior to the sale, SoftBank owned 7.5% of T-Mobile’s business, equivalent to approximately 85.4 million shares. Following its acquisition in 2020, SoftBank’s stake was valued at US$22.8 billion. However, a change in priorities prompted SoftBank to sell some of its shares; Deutsche Telekom was the buyer. Features of the transaction:
– Japanese group sold 21.5 million securities;
– shares were offered in the price range from US$224 to US$228 per unit;
– final value amounted to about US$231 at a discount of 3%.
Despite the sale, SoftBank remains the second-largest shareholder of the American company T-Mobile. Deutsche Telekom became the largest holder of securities with about a 59% share, or approximately 82 million securities. The company acquired some of the shares from SoftBank’s subsidiaries.
Prospects for the sale of shares
According to Bloomberg, the sale of T-Mobile will improve SoftBank’s loan-to-value ratio by about 1-2%. However, the corporation needs to monetize about US$10 billion more to achieve this result. This would lower the LTV ratio below the 30% threshold. Such a result can only occur through investments of approximately US$40 billion in OpenAI, Stargate, and Ampere Computing.
Following the announcement of the deal, T-Mobile shares dropped by nearly 4%, marking the largest decline since April 2025. Meanwhile, the securities of the Japanese bank rose by 1%. Notably, this is the largest sale in the United States since the Toronto-Dominion Bank deal. In February 2025, the bank sold its stake in the Charles Schwab brokerage firm for over US$13 billion.
Sales of shares in companies listed on U.S. exchanges total more than US$91 billion for 2025.
SoftBank’s plans
Like other major investors, SoftBank is focusing its efforts on artificial intelligence. Its president, Masayoshi Son, plans to invest US$30 billion in OpenAI, the developer of ChatGPT. Additionally, SoftBank has promised to allocate hundreds of billions of dollars toward AI infrastructure, including data centers. This program will be implemented as part of the Stargate initiative popularized by Donald Trump. The program aims to develop AI and related infrastructure and requires an estimated investment of US$500 billion.
It is worth noting that SoftBank’s investment strategy was previously focused on the debt financing sector. However, the new tariff policy has reduced the sector’s stability.
