Bloomberg
SoftBank Poised to Reap $16 Billion Profit as Coupang Boosts IPO
(Bloomberg) — SoftBank Group Corp., the biggest shareholder in Coupang Inc., stands to reap an enormous windfall when the South Korean e-commerce leader goes public this week, giving founder Masayoshi Son further evidence his often-criticized startup bets are paying off.The Japanese company owns about 35% of the startup and could report an unrealized gain of as much as $16 billion after Coupang raised the target price range for its initial public offering. That would be the SoftBank Vision Fund’s largest-ever startup profit booked in a single quarter since it began reporting results in 2017.Son has come under heavy criticism for missteps in backing fledgling companies, including WeWork and more recently Greensill Capital. But the South Korean startup adds to a string of hits that have compensated for those losses and pushed his Vision Fund to profit records in the last two quarters. If Coupang succeeds in its public debut, SoftBank’s windfall could exceed the $11 billion it reported from DoorDash Inc.’s December IPO.“This is a decent-size win for Masa and, in some way, it validates his style of going all in to score big,” said Justin Tang, head of Asian research at United First Partners in Singapore. “Their backing of Greensill seems like a rounding error by comparison.”Coupang and its bankers raised the price range of the offering Tuesday, signaling strong demand for the shares. The…
