US President-elect Donald Trump, flanked by SoftBank Group CEO Masayoshi Son, announced on Monday that the Tokyo-based company will invest US$100 billion in the United States over the next four years, in what the two described as boosting the country’s economy. economy.
Trump said in his joint appearance with Sun that the investment will create 100,000 jobs focused on artificial intelligence and related infrastructure, with the funds to be deployed before the end of Trump’s term.
Trump said the investment was evidence of “tremendous confidence in America’s future.” He playfully encouraged Son to invest US$200 billion. The son laughed and said he would try.
The US $100 billion pledge, made during a flag-decorated event at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Palm Beach, Florida, fits Trump’s pledge to support the US economy and reduce the impact of inflation on Americans during his second term. Semester starting January 20.
Trump described Son as “one of the most prominent business leaders of our time.”
It is not clear whether jobs were created from a similar 2016 pledge
Monday’s announcement echoes a similar pledge Son made with Trump in December 2016, when he was president-elect before his first term, at Trump Tower, when Son said he would spend US$50 billion and create 50,000 jobs.
While this money was eventually spent, it is unclear whether these jobs were created. SoftBank is rebuilding its finances after New York-based office equity startup WeWork failed, and after some of the technology companies it invests in through its Vision Fund unit lost popularity among investors.
Trump tends to make grandiose statements promising thousands of jobs, although such investments do not always work out. Early in his first term, he announced a $10 billion US investment by Taiwanese electronics giant Foxconn in a factory in Wisconsin that promised to create thousands of jobs, but most of which has been abandoned.
It is unclear how SoftBank plans to finance the new investment. As of Sept. 30, it had about $29 billion in cash and cash equivalents, according to its most recent earnings report. After a sharp decline between 2021 and 2023, its shares have rebounded, rising nearly 50 percent year-to-date.
CNBC said the financing could come from various sources controlled by SoftBank, including the Vision Fund, capital projects or chip maker Arm Holdings.
Son has been a vocal supporter of the potential of AI and has been pushing to expand SoftBank’s exposure to the sector, taking a stake in OpenAI and acquiring chip startup Graphcore.
In October, Sun reiterated his belief in the coming of super-AI, saying it would require investments of hundreds of billions of dollars.
Son said at the time that he was saving money “so I can make the next big move,” but did not provide any details.
Trump promised last week that he would expand fast-track permits for any company investing $1 billion or more in the United States.
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