SoftBank: Unprecedented Crisis or Opportunity?

It employs a strategy of liquidating existing assets to secure capital for new investments.

In this process, it is intensively injecting funds into acquiring OpenAI shares, thereby strengthening its bet on the AI sector. Kim Dante explained, "They are continuously selling off their holdings to sustain themselves. So, they keep selling various other assets to stay afloat. And as they keep buying into OpenAI, their focus becomes more concentrated, and it truly is a significant, ongoing bet."

It is pointed out that if a significant problem arises with an invested company or an IPO fails, SoftBank's financial health could rapidly deteriorate. Kim Dante warned, "If, for example, a financial crisis suddenly occurs next year, and stock prices fall, or OpenAI's stock price drops, or it fails to list, or a problem arises with OpenAI, SoftBank could actually go bankrupt."

SoftBank's dollar-denominated bonds currently yield about 9% in the market. This is a figure typically observed in bonds of companies with lower credit ratings.

SoftBank is rated as a B-grade company, with analysis suggesting it is practically at junk bond level. Kim Dante explained, "SoftBank's dollar-denominated bonds are now almost at 9%—that's how the market currently assesses them. It's a B-grade company, which is almost at the level of a junk bond."

SoftBank has grown by borrowing yen at low interest rates, converting it to dollars, and investing in dollar assets. This is considered a prime example of yen carry trading.

As the yen's strength persists and Japanese bond yields rise, the risks of this investment approach are increasing. If the yen strengthens, returns on dollar assets relatively decrease, and rising bond yields increase funding costs, threatening SoftBank's investment structure. Kim Dante pointed out, "SoftBank can be seen as the quintessential company for yen carry trading. SoftBank was the company that engaged the most in borrowing low-interest yen, converting it to dollars, and investing in dollar assets."

If OpenAI's performance improves and it is valued at a similar scale to Anthropic, around $2 trillion, and then lists, SoftBank's value is expected to rise significantly.

Considering that SoftBank currently holds about 13% of OpenAI shares, if OpenAI's listing is successful, SoftBank's current corporate value has the potential to grow by more than 200 times. Kim Dante predicted, "What if OpenAI's numbers keep getting better, and it lists at a similar scale to Anthropic's target valuation, around $2 trillion? Then, even at $2 trillion, SoftBank's current corporate value would be roughly 200 times what it is now."

As of September 7, OpenAI's revenue share was 51%, surpassing Anthropic's 49%.

This suggests that OpenAI has begun to gain an advantage in market competition by rapidly expanding its revenue share since the launch of Astra. Kim Dante explained, "There's a site called Open Router. According to that site's data, if you look at this chart, the top line shows Anthropic's model revenue, and as of the week of September 7, OpenAI now has slightly more. People are spending more money on OpenAI's models, at about 51 to 49."

Anthropic's ARR records approximately $6.5 billion, showing a significant gap compared to OpenAI's just over $4 billion. This is because Anthropic quickly gained traction and solidified its position in the enterprise market.

This revenue gap indicates that OpenAI faces the challenge of accelerating its growth in the enterprise market. Kim Dante pointed out, "I'm talking about annualized revenue, and typically, software companies closely watch ARR. By ARR standards, Anthropic is still higher."

An analysis of the career paths of all tech company employees showed that Anthropic was a frequent final destination.

This suggests that Anthropic has a corporate structure likely to make it a long-term winner in the artificial intelligence field. Kim Dante explained, "Anthropic is a talent black hole. If you map out where tech company employees go, the ultimate destination for all tech companies turns out to be Anthropic."

He has led OpenAI's practical research and development.

After graduating from Warsaw University and earning a Ph.D. from Carnegie Mellon, he served as Research Lead and Chief Scientist at OpenAI for nine years, demonstrating key capabilities. Kim Dante stated, "There is a Chief Scientist at OpenAI named Jakub Pachocki. You can consider him to be Ilya Sutskever's successor."

SoftBank has recently been under financial pressure due to aggressive, debt-financed investments. Compounding this, the postponement of OpenAI's IPO has led to short-term liquidity issues.

However, SoftBank still holds core salable assets like ARM, leaving room to secure liquidity through asset divestments. Kim Dante said, "While SoftBank has recently been making aggressive, debt-financed investments and faces short-term liquidity issues due to OpenAI's IPO delay, it's not as if there are no assets it can sell."

The first key observation point for SoftBank's future is OpenAI's computer utilization capabilities. GPT-6 Astra has demonstrated excellent computer usage skills, proving the potential of multimodal AI.

Maintaining superiority in multimodal capabilities, even as competitors catch up, is OpenAI's key task. The ability to maintain a lead over competing models like Gemini 4 is expected to be a crucial variable for the success of SoftBank's investment. Kim Dante mentioned, "In my opinion, there are two main observation points for SoftBank's future. The first is computers, as GPT-6 Astra has shown quite proficient computer usage."

The second key to SoftBank's investment outlook is the successful development of personal agents. Major Silicon Valley companies like Inst, Grok Bot, and Meta Muse are fiercely competing, viewing personal agents as the next killer app for AI.

Success for personal agents requires computer usage ability, stable virtual machine infrastructure, and long context processing capability. These three elements must be organically combined to provide practical utility.

OpenAI is accelerating personal agent development by recruiting Peter Steinberger, founder of Open Clo. Kim Dante said, "The second observation point is personal agents. I believe the true killer app for AI will be personal agents."

SoftBank is currently described as being in an "unprecedented crisis," as it makes aggressive, debt-financed investments and faces short-term liquidity issues due to OpenAI's IPO postponement.

However, there is also a view that OpenAI's growth potential and the advent of the AI era could represent an "unprecedented opportunity" for SoftBank. Kim Dante added, "Although I called it an unprecedented crisis in today's video, in some ways, SoftBank could also be facing an unprecedented opportunity."