SHARES JUMP MOST IN A DECADE

SOFTBANK Group shares jumped the most in a decade on plans to repurchase as much as ¥600 billion (R73.58bn) of stock, a shift in strategy for founder Masayoshi Son, who has long favoured spending his capital on tech investments. Son unveiled SoftBank’s biggest-yet buyback as he tries to close the gap between what he thinks the company is worth and its market value. It will be funded with proceeds from the ¥2.4 trillion initial public offering of the company’s telecommunications unit in December. The stock jumped 18 percent, the most since November of 2008, reaching the daily limit to close at ¥9 962. “This latest buyback changes the equation and puts a floor under SoftBank stock,” Atul Goyal, an analyst at Jefferies Group, wrote. Son spent much of his post-earnings presentation on Wednesday explaining that SoftBank’s holdings were worth ¥21trln net of debt, while the market value was ¥9trln. The gap is even laid out on its website, which shows the stock trading at a 50 percent discount. SoftBank’s ¥600bn buyback added more than twice that amount to the value of its stock. Its market cap rose by about ¥1.9trln to ¥11trln. I Bloomberg