SoftBank’s OpenAI-related debt in focus as strong quarter looms

SoftBank Group is about to report what should be a genuinely impressive quarter. LSEG analysts project net profit of 236 billion yen, roughly $1.5 billion, for Q1 FY2026. The engine behind those numbers is a familiar name: OpenAI.

SoftBank’s 11% stake in OpenAI is now valued at $80 billion as of end-March 2026, a 47% jump from $54.4 billion at the close of 2025.

The debt picture gets complicated

SoftBank secured a $40 billion bridge loan back in March 2026, partly to fund its growing commitments. The company also proposed a $10 billion margin loan against its OpenAI stake. That plan hit a wall. Lenders got cold feet over valuation risks tied to OpenAI, and SoftBank was forced to scale the margin loan down to $6 billion.

S&P Global Ratings downgraded SoftBank’s outlook to negative, pointing to potential deterioration in the company’s asset liquidity.

Where the money needs to go

The company needs an estimated $25 billion in total funding for 2026. That includes $30 billion in additional commitments to OpenAI and $16 billion earmarked for Stargate.

The OpenAI stake’s current valuation reflects a funding round that priced the AI company at $840 billion. OpenAI remains a private company with no public market price discovery, which means its valuation is essentially whatever the last group of investors agreed to pay. That’s precisely the dynamic making lenders uncomfortable.

SoftBank’s AI conviction play

SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son has never been shy about making concentrated bets. The Vision Fund era saw massive wagers on companies like WeWork and Uber, with mixed results that are now well-documented. The current AI push represents an even larger concentration of capital into a single thesis.

What matters most for anyone watching SoftBank is the gap between paper gains and liquidity. The company’s assets are overwhelmingly concentrated in private, illiquid stakes. That illiquidity is exactly what S&P flagged in its downgrade.

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