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SoftBank's damage from Uber and WeWork could exceed $5 billion

Oct 09 (Japan Times) - Masayoshi Son’s startups have had a rough few months, from a botched initial public offering by WeWork to a sharp decline in shares of Uber Technologies Inc.

Now analysts are beginning to calculate that the damage for Son’s SoftBank Group Corp. will likely reach into the billions of dollars.

Mitsubishi UFJ Morgan Stanley Securities Co. cut its profit estimate for SoftBank’s Vision Fund, its main investment vehicle, by ¥580 billion ($5.4 billion) to an operating loss of ¥367.6 billion for the September quarter, citing declines in the stock prices of Uber and Slack Technologies Inc. and the withdrawn WeWork IPO. It also reduced SoftBank Group’s fiscal year operating profit by the same amount to ¥1.01 trillion.

Son is going through a particularly rocky stretch after repositioning SoftBank from a telecom operator into an investment conglomerate, with stakes in scores of startups around the world.

He built a personal fortune of about $14 billion with strategic bets on companies such as China e-commerce giant Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. But the recent troubles have weighed on SoftBank’s shares, pushing them down about 30 percent from their peak earlier this year as investors grow skittish about startup valuations.

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