Sometimes you have to sell the thing you love most to buy the thing you love even more. That's essentially what happened to SoftBank Group Corp (SFTBY) founder Masayoshi Son, who admitted publicly that dumping his company's entire Nvidia Corp. (NVDA) stake was an emotionally painful decision made purely out of financial necessity.
Speaking at the FII Priority Asia forum in Tokyo, Son revealed he "was crying" as he parted with the shares. The sale, disclosed in November, brought in $5.83 billion—cash that SoftBank desperately needed to fund its aggressive expansion into artificial intelligence, including a growing partnership with OpenAI and ambitious data center projects spanning multiple continents.
"I just had more need for money to invest in OpenAI and other projects," Son told the audience, according to CNBC. He made it clear that under different circumstances, SoftBank would never have sold "a single share" of Nvidia.
The timing makes the decision sting even more. Nvidia became the first company in history to top a $5 trillion market cap on October 29, after hitting $4.5 trillion earlier that month. Bank of America Securities added fuel to the rally by reaffirming its Buy rating and hiking its price forecast from $235 to $275, signaling strong institutional conviction in Nvidia's dominance in the AI chip market.
Nvidia's Role in Global Tech Diplomacy
CEO Jensen Huang amplified investor optimism by urging Washington to take a balanced approach to the U.S.–China tech rivalry, warning that isolating China's developer ecosystem would backfire. Meanwhile, President Donald Trump said he plans to discuss Nvidia's "super duper" Blackwell chips with Chinese President Xi Jinping, underscoring just how central Nvidia has become to global tech diplomacy.
Huang also announced partnerships to build seven U.S. supercomputers and introduced NVQLInk, a breakthrough technology that links Nvidia GPUs with quantum computers.
SoftBank Goes All In on AI
SoftBank (SFTBF) has accelerated its AI push this year through initiatives like the Stargate Project, data centers, and its acquisition of chip designer Ampere Computing. The company may "potentially" deepen its investment in OpenAI depending on performance and future valuation rounds, a person familiar with the matter told CNBC.
Son has repeatedly said SoftBank is "all in" on OpenAI and predicted the startup could become the world's most valuable company. That conviction has already lifted SoftBank's financials: the company reported second-quarter profit more than doubling to 2.5 trillion yen ($16.6 billion), helped by valuation gains tied to OpenAI.
Dismissing the AI Bubble Fears
Son also dismissed rising concerns that the AI industry is overheating, arguing that critics "are not smart enough" to understand the scale of what's coming. He predicted that future superintelligent AI and robotics will generate at least 10% of global GDP, easily justifying the trillions flowing into the sector.
It's a bold stance, especially considering Son's track record includes both visionary wins and spectacular flops. But if he's right about OpenAI's trajectory, selling Nvidia—tears and all—might eventually look like the right move. If he's wrong, well, those tears were probably justified.
NVDA Price Action: Nvidia shares were up 0.61% at $182.56 during premarket trading on Wednesday, according to market data.