SoftBank Shares Drop 10% as Tech Sell-Off Hits Asian Markets

CNBC reported Thursday that SoftBank shares tumbled roughly 10% as a wave of profit-taking in U.S. technology stocks rippled across Asian markets overnight.

SoftBank Leads Losses Across the Region

SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son has spent months riding an AI-fueled investor rally. That enthusiasm hit a wall Thursday. The Japanese investment giant’s stock last traded 10.6% lower at 7,434 yen. The decline dragged alongside other regional heavyweights. Taiwan’s TSMC fell approximately 1.65%, while Foxconn shed more than 4%. South Korean chipmakers Samsung and SK Hynix dropped 1.25% and 2.75% respectively. Both Korean firms had only recently crossed $1 trillion in market valuation during May.

Son Calls Any Correction a Buying Opportunity

Son, speaking to CNBC earlier this week, remained publicly bullish. He predicted the AI revolution would dwarf the dot-com boom of the early 2000s by a factor of fifty. He drew a historical parallel to the 1929 crash in electronics and automotive industries, noting those sectors rose steadily for a century afterward. Any near-term pullback, Son argued, would represent the strongest possible entry point for long-term investors.

Background: A Year of Rapid Gains Invites Scrutiny

SoftBank’s stock had surged around 70% year-to-date before Thursday’s decline. That run came on the back of intense investor enthusiasm for the company’s AI portfolio strategy. The rally was striking enough to push SoftBank past Toyota Motor as Japan’s most valuable publicly traded company. However, Deutsche Bank analyst Peter Milliken cautioned in a recent investor note that markets had grown fixated on short-term price momentum. He suggested investors were struggling to model SoftBank’s long-run earnings trajectory with meaningful precision.

Asset Sales Add to the Day’s Storyline

Separately, SoftBank moved to trim one of its portfolio positions this week. Through an affiliate vehicle, the firm offloaded a 3.25% stake in Indian eyewear company Lenskart, selling around 56.5 million shares at roughly 508 rupees each. The transaction was valued at approximately 28.73 billion rupees. Buyers included ICICI Prudential mutual funds, Kotak Mahindra, and the Los Angeles City Employees’ Retirement System. The sale underscores SoftBank’s ongoing effort to actively manage its sprawling investment book even as market pressure mounts. Meanwhile, U.S. tech names held up comparatively better, with Nvidia, Tesla, and Alphabet each posting only modest after-hours declines.

Read Next: What Rising AI Spending Means for Tech Valuations in 2026