SoftBank’s Son Transforms $5.5 Billion to $17 Billion Overnight

Market value jumps by 1.65 trillion yen on buyback plan
The planned repurchase amount is about a third of that gain

SoftBank Group shares are surging after the company announced a buyback plan. Pavel Alpeyev reports.(Source: Bloomberg)

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By Pavel Alpeyev

February 7, 2019 at 4:11 AM UTC

Updated on

February 8, 2019 at 2:00 AM UTC

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Call it the Masayoshi Son mathematical distortion field.

The founder of SoftBank Group Corp. added about 1.65 trillion yen ($15 billion) to the market value of his company Thursday — by unveiling a plan to buy back shares worth about a third of that amount. The value of Son’s stock in SoftBank rose by about $4 billion on Thursday. His fortune rose about $2.6 billion after the rally, according to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, which excludes pledged shares from the net worth calculation.