SoftBank Group Corp
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SoftBank Group Corp
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[Interpreted] Thank you very much for waiting everyone. Now we would like to start SoftBank Group Corp. earnings results briefing for 6-month period ended September 30, 2022. First of all, I would like to introduce today's participants. From left, we have Yoshimitsu Goto, Board Director and CFO; Kazuko Kimiwada, Senior Vice President and Head of Accounting Unit; Navneet Govil, Managing Partner and Chief Financial Officer, SoftBank Investment Advisors; Ian Thornton, Investor Relations, Vice President, Arm. Today's announcement is live broadcast over Internet.
Now I would like to invite Mr. Masayoshi Son, Chairman and CEO, SoftBank Group Corp to make opening remarks. Mr. Son, please.
[Interpreted] Good afternoon, everyone. This is Masayoshi Son, SoftBank Group Corp. Usually, I sit over here on the far left from your side and make a presentation, is the kind of a traditional way we've been doing for the announcement. But this time, we have a slight change. I'm not going to sit over here. And going on, this is the last time for me to be standing on this stage for the earnings results announcement to explain you and update you the quarterly result to you or give you any update on the business strategy.
So with today's -- this opportunity, I would like to make it for the -- make it last. In the meantime, Mr. Goto, next to me, he is going to make a presentation every time every quarter going forward. So I believe that he's been very excited for that moment. But he's been silent and sitting over here just during my presentation. So hope that he is going to make a presentation going forward and hope that you have a good time to listen to him going forward.
So maybe you're going to be wondered what happened? Are you unhealthy? Are you sick? Are you going to retire? You may wonder and you may -- and we did receive some questions from you, but that's not true at all. I am in good health, good shape. I have very much motivated and excited about the business. So I have good spirits and full of energy. And you may ask why, if you are in good shape, why not you're going to make a presentation for the quarterly results. Why this will be the last time? And let me explain to you why is that, and that will be the last message from me in the meantime at the quarterly results.
Of course, at the shareholders meeting, I will be attending. And if there is any news or any updates that I would like to make, of course, I'm prepared to do so. But unless otherwise, I believe that this will be the last in the meantime. So let me come to the center of the podium and give you a little bit of explanation in the presentation.
So as a business person, before I start at SoftBank, there was my origin, back when I was age of 19. I believe that was like an autumn season. I was driving a car, I get off the car. And when I was walking that was in United States. I was still a student, and I was reading the science magazine, and I was walking and reading, and I came across this photo. This looks like future cities or some kind of signs. This looks quite unique and strange and I wondered what is it. And I turn the next page, and I understand that this is the chip of microcomputer. That was the first time I understand that this is the microcomputer chip.
This is just the size of the fingertip, even less than 1 centimeter square thing. It was on the fingertip. And I was reading the article, I understood that this was computer. But then as a nat student, I was user of the terminal by IBM, large computer almost every day. And also -- I also used several types of computers. So I knew what computer is, and I knew what the computer program was, but I didn't know that it comes from this size, fingertip size, how small that is. That was not something that I imagined at that moment.
So this photo and the article that I read on the magazine, I couldn't stop crying, human being, actually encountered and also invented the thing that may exceed human beings' intelligence. That's something that I felt when I read this article. So actually, I was not stopped crying. And I finally encountered something that exceed human being who is actually doing the best intelligence activities of all kinds.
And since then, 45 years have passed, right now, I'm 65 years old, so almost 50 years. So 46 years since then, it was like just a flight, a time flight and I flew and these days, information revolution is evolving every day and growing even more. Even after 46 years since I saw the microcomputer chip, first time, it's not yet matured, but actually, this big pan is growing even bigger. That's how I feel. So human beings born in this earth and tens of hundreds of thousands of years that's been passed depending on how you define humankind, but in the past 50 years or so, information revolution since it's done, it spreads everywhere.
And now that you cannot really live without smartphone anymore in everyday basis. That's the kind of a situation we are living right now. The center of computing has been shifted from PC era, the circuit board era, the personal computer, PC was kind of the device that spreads around the people, but now that trend has been shifted to smartphones since Steve Jobs created this device to us. At the same time, center of the CPU have shifted from Intel to ARM. That's how I understand.
Center of computing has shifted from PC to smartphone. And from smartphone to even farther variety of devices that CPU is going to be embedded. So it's exactly the word Internet of Things, IoT. And that information is coming back together to the cloud and stored one after another. So every kind of things will be gathered and stored in the cloud. So it's going to be asset or treasure box of the information is going to be the cloud. And the center of the computing for this cloud is actually shifted from Intel architecture to ARM architecture.
Why ARM? Why the center of computer has been moved from Intel to ARM? It's because the source of energy, which is the power, the gas was essential things for automobile to move the car, but now that's been shifted to electricity and now that we are entering into electric vehicle era. Center of computers because its energy source is electricity and only is electricity. That's the reason why that the center of the CPU architecture has been shifted from Intel to ARM.
In big picture, there was -- there were Intel and ARM. That was those 2 architectures in this era. And as the biggest source of energy, this computer, because it uses the electricity, so that is why efficiency use of electricity and the design for that is important and that made ARM even stronger. At the time of personal computer, ARM was believed that the capabilities or the performance of computing is weak. Computing power was not good enough. That was people's recognition, and that time has stayed a bit long, but actually, recently, that's proved that, that was not true.
Even in the cloud area, the major cloud is now using straight to ARM architecture. Even in PC world, already that sign has been seen starting from last year and so. So a variety of things is going to be digitized, computerized. And then the stage for ARM is going to be even bigger. Since the foundation of SoftBank, just a little bit before the foundation, but back in -- at the age of 19, I encountered the photo, which led me to the path to the information revolution. And I was so impressed, and I was so moved.
And now I became an owner of ARM, who is the center of the computer. I didn't imagine when I was 19 at that moment at all. Since the pandemic started with COVID, we didn't know how it is going to be dangerous for the humankind. We could be very at risk, falling down to the valley, that was something that I explained and presented at the earnings in a couple of quarters ago, and I explained that the unicorn is going to be falling down to the valley. But actually, unicorn was the one that recovered because of online phenomena. And actually, the valley of COVID was not that deep. Risk was not that large. That was something that I felt.
But because, we didn't know how deep it will be, and we were about to fall down to the valley, so that is why that we decided to survive and dispose or monetize our asset. So I wanted to grow the company and business. So that is why I've been raising money as much as possible, try to switch myself so that we were able to create bigger transactions with large transactions of acquisitions. And at the time of Internet bubble, even we have to sell and monetize assets so that we can survive back then. And even at the Lehman crisis, we have survived by monetizing our assets.
So that moment, we actually sold many things. And this was the third crisis for us, which was a COVID shock. We have also decided once again to monetize whatever we have. As a part of that, we were to let ARM go back then. Personally, that was the least assets that I wanted to sell, but to survive was even more important for us so that I was crying but decided to let go.
But after we monetizing other assets, and we came to conclusion that we don't have to sell everything. So that's why the 1/3 was sold in cash, 1/3 receiving NVIDIA share in exchange -- excuse me, 2/3 that we're receiving NVIDIA share in exchange. So it was like a selling, but at the same time buying type of expression that I used back then.
So we become the major shareholder. So by combining ARM and NVIDIA, we thought that it's going to be even more powerful in the era of AI and computing era. However, if ARM and NVIDIA combined together, it could be too powerful, which was said by the many people and been declined or denied by several authorities. That's why that we have to give up this idea of combining those 2 companies together. But at the same time, from the beginning, this was the least asset that we wanted to sell, if we were not a crisis.
So not receiving approval for this acquisition, and at the moment that we received that decline, we realized that the valley of the COVID was not that deep and vaccinations has been going on amongst the people, so that receiving such decline was something that we could swallow. And a few months later, although that we passed the COVID valley, we start seeing the Ukraine situation, Russian situation and start seeing the severe inflations around the world in many of the central banks been providing our financial support.
And also, many people who hesitate to make any consumption start consuming once that we see some settle down of COVID. In addition to that, we start seeing the price of the energy going hike because of the Ukraine situation. We saw those equity market around the world was in damaged. So we're saying that we wanted to become the vision capitalist. We are going to make a lot of investments through Vision Fund, so we are very motivated a few years ago, and that was our policy, and that was our announcement.
But looking at the current situation, regardless of public securities or private securities, almost all the investments that we have made is not showing a good performance. Our Vision Funds suffered. But not only us, investors around the world is also seeing the same situation because of the damage of the equity market. Under such circumstance, I think through, what is the direction that SoftBank should be taking? Vision Fund, should we continue investing one after another? Or should we reduce our debt and reduce the debt ratio, having higher cash position so that we can make a safety drive of the business?
And there are several intense discussions internally. I myself also think through. And the conclusion was that we will not be able to see the settle of the inflation in the meantime. Even public security is going to be having a difficult time. And there are time lags for the private securities, which we believe that is going to be suffered. In the meantime, then we believe then that we have to be in defensive mode which we announced, and we made a decision earlier than the others, which was a good thing for us. So continuously keeping this direction.
So for new investments, we would like to be more selective in the Vision Fund has restructured and also has had a cost reduction, and we had executed the program. And during that time, as entrepreneur, as a business person, I do need to work on something. However, unfortunate things for me and us was that ARM came back to us. I could concentrate and devote myself in ARM, which I've been thinking for the past few months, and I've been focusing on ARM. And especially recently, it made me realized once again how great ARM is in the base for the ARM's growth and the source of the energy and our growth opportunity is something tremendous. That's something that I reminded myself once again.
So since the acquisition of ARM, even before then, I've been in love with ARM. And recently that the version 9 was released, and the feature of this version 9 start being used in next phase, and how can we best use of ARM? And what kind of interesting service, interesting technology can be made? And thinking about all that made me feel great technology innovation, great innovations, and I'm so convinced with all those.
So that's why in the coming few years, I only like to focus on this thing. So the next explosive growth of ARM is something that I would like to concentrate on, and I devote myself into that. And other management, we're going to be keeping defensive mode. To be defensive, Goto-san, Mr. Goto is more suitable than me as a Chief Financial Officer that who can keep the good defensive mode, and he should be the person that who update you how we're keeping our defensive mode. So me, personally, I'm the aggressive person, I'm not a defensive person. So I like to be concentrate and focused on the ARM. And now that I'm being in very deep in technology and also deep in business models and business strategy for ARM from the morning to the night, and that's something that the source of my energy, source of my happiness, source of my excitement. And I believe that's also be the base for the best contribution for the SoftBank growth.
So that's why I would like to focus on ARM and some technology around them. And I will be the best for stakeholder of SoftBank, best for humankind, best for the company, that's how deeply convinced I am. That's why I decided to provide happiness for everyone with information revolution, which is coming back to my original philosophy. And purely, I would like to pursue myself for this happiness. As a result, any earnings results announcement or day-to-day operation, I can ask Mr. Goto and also other senior management and keep the company running.
At the earnings results announcement, this will be my last message for you in the meantime. And Mr. Goto is going to explain you the content of our performance and he will be and also other members is going to address any questions that you may have. And feel free to ask any questions. That's all from me. Thank you very much.
[Interpreted] That was Mr. Masayoshi Son, Chairman and CEO of SoftBank Group. Please give us a few moments before we start the presentation. Thank you for your patience.
Thank you very much for waiting. Now I would like to invite Mr. Goto, Board Director and CFO, to present to you the earnings results and business overview.
[Interpreted] Thank you very much for your kind introduction. My name is Goto. I think Mr. Son's presentation covers everything. But our job is to make sure that we communicate the facts for the last 3 months to a year, as Mr. Son mentioned earlier. And by the way, Mr. Son call himself as a businessperson and entrepreneur, he is the Founder of SoftBank. And also from our perspective, he is an entrepreneur, I don't see any other person who has such an entrepreneurship not only in Japan, but also in the world. I have been working with Mr. Son for the last 23 years, and he is entrepreneur and under the circumstance, we will make sure that we fulfill our missions. And in the meantime, I think Mr. Son's executing his entrepreneurship will serve you the best. So your continued support for us, Mr. Son and the senior management will be highly appreciated.
Now the financial results for the last 3 months. Not only talking about the things in the last 3 months, but also taking this opportunity, I'd like to talk more about what's going on in SoftBank from a financial perspective. Again, we are in a defensive mode. And being in SoftBank for the last 23 years, and we have gone through those ups and downs and by focusing on defense, looking back, my history in SoftBank, current financial position is the most stable and best level in my SoftBank history, I'm confident.
Even though NAV has been going down, it's JPY 16.7 trillion, and the loan to value is 15%, which is too low under normal operation and cash position, JPY 4.3 trillion, which means 4 years' worth of bond redemption. So again, we have a very stable, safe balance sheet. And why are we doing this? Well, I'd like to touch upon market environment. Investment companies like us, like Sequoia, Tiger Global, are looking at the market environment just like us and inflation in the United States.
CPI announcement yesterday made us relieved, but I believe that they keep raising rates to contain inflation. Consequently, the market have been and will be corrected for some time, especially in tech sector. So there should be continuous uncertainties in the market. And when talking about geopolitical risks, cost for piece could be expensive. That's how we realize under the current condition. Infrastructure costs went up and food cost went up and prices have increased dramatically in general. Under the circumstance, we kept focusing on defense. And how should we continue on this mode? You may ask. Of course, the tide will be shifted some time, and we have to anticipate when that will come. But we will make sure we take time before we shift our position.
Now let me talk about the consolidated results. For the first half of FY '22, we posted JPY 3.2 trillion of net sales, JPY 849.6 billion of loss on investment, JPY 292.6 billion of income before income tax, and JPY 129.1 billion of net loss.
Looking at loss on investment. As you can see on the slide, in the first half of this year, Vision Fund posted a loss of JPY 4.3 trillion. But for Alibaba shares, as we announced in August, through early retirement of Alibaba transactions and by reduced holding of Alibaba, we saw a huge gain. I'll come back to the point later in detail.
You can see the similar results in terms of income before income tax by the segment. Alibaba tracts are done at the holding company level. SVF Vision Fund business recorded JPY 3.4 trillion loss, while investment business of holding companies, including Alibaba, posted JPY 3.3 trillion income and consolidated result was JPY 292.6 billion positive.
For net income quarterly, for the first quarter, from April through June, we saw JPY 3.2 trillion of net loss. However, in the second quarter, we saw JPY 3 trillion of net income. The main source of the huge gain is Alibaba. We signed the prepaid forward contracts using Alibaba shares for our financing activities. For example, 1 year ahead, principally, we should settle in cash, but there is an option to roll over. So we have options, allowing us to make a decision how to settle the transaction.
Looking at uncertainties in China, assets in China should be looked at, and we have to monetize assets in China that can be safely monetized. And by settling earlier, we should show the markets that we don't have to worry about financing in the future. By reducing our holding of Alibaba, Alibaba became equity method associate from accounting perspective. As you can see on the slide, we posted a gain on settlement of prepaid forward contract, which was JPY 0.6 trillion and -- excuse me, JPY 0.8 trillion of derivative gain thanks to hedging effect of the contracts. Those gains came from closing the contracts early, and that resulted in JPY 4 trillion of gain from remeasurement or remaining holding of Alibaba shares from book value to fair value. And total impact on consolidated P&L was JPY 4.3 trillion. By utilizing group assets, we want to strike the right balance.
And now talking about foreign exchanges. What kind of impact foreign exchange changes have on our company? In terms of net asset value, which is very important, because our corporate value comes from net asset value, from that perspective, our assets are falling currently -- excuse me, most of our assets are foreign currency denominated. And also, most of our deposits are foreign currency denominated. That means weaker yen has positive impact on NAV.
For this term, it was JPY 2.9 trillion. But again, foreign exchanges change. And what we want to do is to focus on improving values without being influenced by changes of foreign exchanges. Even though we posted a loss of JPY 1.1 trillion, we saw increase of equity by JPY 2.6 trillion. We had debt, including asset-backed finance. We could offset. But according to the accounting rule, we should separate such debt. Even though, again, we posted a loss of JPY 1 trillion, we saw increase in equity from accounting perspective.
Now the trend of net asset value, which has been going down in the last 12 months, and that's natural from the market environment. But still, we have JPY 16.7 trillion of net asset value as of today. If you compare that of March end to September end, it was JPY 23 trillion as of March end and down to JPY 19 trillion as of September 30 and debt decreased also. So as a result, NAV was smaller than that of equity value of holdings. And net value per share and share price as of March end, it was about JPY 11,000 per share. And share price back then was JPY 5,559. The discount percent was 50%. As of September 30, net asset value per share was JPY 10,800 and share price was JPY 4,900. Then discount was 55%, which was huge.
Market often called it SoftBank discount. Why discount? We have been talking about it with investors all the time. In that few weeks, our share price has bounced back. As of November 9, well, today, about JPY 6,950 or something, but as of November 9, over JPY 7,000. In any case, compared to September 30, our share price bounced back. So I believe that the discount at the moment is around 40%. So we want to keep working on decreasing 40% discount level by analyzing from different aspects. We keep working on that.
Now talking about equity value of holdings. This slide shows equity value of holdings by assets. On the right-hand side of the chart, you see percentage. Alibaba accounts for 15%. It was bigger like 30%, 40% in the past. SoftBank KK accounts for 11%, SVF1/2 LatAm, all in all, around 43%. Historically speaking, Alibaba or Orange has been smaller and smaller. Why? First, thanks to monetization. And second, decrease of share price. And if you look at the pie chart, you can see the change clearly. In balance, our portfolio is important from a rating perspective and investment perspective, especially looking at the percentage of listed shares, which is very important for rating. Percentage of listing companies decreased from 52% to 45% -- 44%, while the old asset value went down, it is pretty good. We are working on preparing our IPO. And once ARM's value is unleashed, I believe that proportion of listed shares would go up.
Now that I would like to go into a little bit more detail in how we're going to be defensive. Now we are very much slowing down the new investment activities, effectively almost stopped. So from that sense, we would like to make a collection of the investments, which means that we are receiving cash. So cash in situation is continued. If we do nothing, we just improve our balance sheet. As a result, 2 stakeholders that we have, which is equity holders and the bondholders or credit investors, more specifically, banks or the bondholders, those credit investors. So those are the 2 major stakeholders, and they have a different interest, different objectives.
If we do nothing, we will improve our balance sheet so that we can see the better quality in loan and better in bonds. But at the same time, we do need to make a return to shareholders, for example, buybacks, continuous dividend payouts, those that we've been executing in a continuous basis. So first, I would like to show you some credit index loan-to-value. So the loan-to-value is actually very steady. And as I mentioned in the beginning of this presentation, 15% or so, and if we are in the investment mode, then that we are not working properly, so it's not levered enough.
SoftBank Group's most important job for finance team is to pursue the most appropriate level of leverage. That's the kind of an important agenda for me as well as for team. So pursuing the best and appropriate leverage, then that we'll be able to have a higher possibility of making a best return to shareholders. And also, that will be the best for the retirement or the service of the debt. So if the credit index is too high, then that means that the less profitability even that you buy the not levered companies bonds, that's not making much money. So appropriate level of leverage is also important for the credit investors as well.
So we're trying to find the sweet spot for that is going to be the -- and it has been and is going to be the important mission for the finance team. And here is the monetization and capital allocation, JPY 2.7 trillion cash position was there with us on the -- at the end of March 2022. Since then, we've been having several transactions including the Alibaba forward contract, which gave us JPY 3.4 trillion in monetization. And then that we've been using those monies for the buybacks or the debt service.
But still, that gives us undrawn commitment line from the banks, including that, that we have about JPY 4 trillion, the cash position. This JPY 4.3 trillion actually is a level that allows us to cover coming 4 years debt service. So bonds, we have to make sure that we have to secure the repayments of those. For the other products and installment anything like products, installments with banks or the others that can be negotiable in terms of terms and everything, Swiss banks, but bond is not something like that. A service of the debt or the repayments of the bond is something we have to make sure to secure the source for that because we are quite prominent and a big user of the bond.
So that's why that we believe that we have to make sure that we have good positions of the cash to cover the bond redemption. And when it comes to the net debt, that's the deposit -- cash less deposit. I believe that the net debt is most logical to speak of the company. However, frequently asked question is that are you repaying your loans or the debt. So here, I wanted to show you our gross debt in the past 6 months that we've been doing the actual payments quite largely. As you can see, about JPY 2.4 trillion debt has been repaid. And the bonds not only to cover the redemption of the bonds, but also or like a buyback of shares, we've been doing the buyback of bonds as well. So we have about JPY 300 billion level of the buyback of bonds. And also the early retirements has been also done for the bonds.
And also asset-backed financing, we don't have much need for the financing. So this has been also repaid one after another. In the loan by banks because we don't have much purpose of use so that commitment credit lines, those that we've been used that we repay and we just keep the undrawn portion and for the loan refinancing because we have a good cash position. So based on the discussion with counterparties that we try to make early repayments. So those has been also improved dramatically.
And now the going to the equity holders or shareholders return. Last year, this time that we have announced JPY 1 trillion buyback of our shares, which has finished at November 8. Last year that I said I may not be able to finish all that amount, and we have started it. And actually, we were able to accomplish all the amount that we've been planned and announced.
And after that, as in addition to this JPY 1 trillion, we have also announced JPY 400 billion level of the buyback, and we've been executing this program and the buyback because we have quite a long time of the insider period. And once that we announced the earnings that we have a bit open for the insider information so that there that we use and discussed with Trust Bank, keep them the order. And once we set the order with Trust Bank, we cannot change the terms, we cannot change the order.
But there are transaction volume increase and decrease, then the buyback amount is going to change as well in the past few weeks. Actually, our transaction volume of our share was very volatile, actually increased to 3 to 4x or 5x, then purchase actually accelerated 3x, 4x and 5x, as a result. Somehow, it's the same day as the announcements yesterday, as of yesterday, we have finished all the JPY 400 billion in buyback. Speed-wise, it was too quick and it may make some speculations, and I was a bit worried. But actually, it was just a matter of technicality.
Share buyback. Actually, when you see the past trend in the past 5 years, we made about cumulative amount was JPY 5 trillion of the buyback, I believe. This is the -- I believe we are the biggest buyback company, amongst Japanese company. And when you compare with other global companies, this is the past 3 years since the 2019 and those public companies around the world, and we are in top 10 for buyback. And Toyota is the #45. So this is a kind of a position that we take for the buyback and we want you to see those comparable data.
Now turning into some group activities. First is Vision Fund. In this quarter, environment is still tough. In here, $9,959 million and compared to previous quarter or a year-on-year basis, we are making slight improvement. This is a long time -- a long investment. So we don't want to be moving around policies in short-term period, but rather like to see the longer period. This is a cumulative gain and loss in the past 1 year or so. Unfortunately, that it comes to kind of offsetting all the gains that we received. But quarterly basis, now that you see that this -- there is some signs of hitting the bottom. So as a long-term operation that we would like to make sure that we can have a firm performance for the investors.
Vision Fund. We have Vision Fund 1 and Vision Fund 2. So let me share some data for Vision Fund 1 first. This one has a third-party investors as well. And the $89 billion is the investment cost and the cumulative investment return is $102.9 billion, so that it shows certain gains here. There are still public companies currently held, so we would like to make sure that we have -- we can make a good results and performance share with the investors. The blue portion, you can see some declines there because there are some valuation downs in public market, but compared to the end of September, now that we are in the beginning of November, this blue portion is actually increasing by $2 billion or so, I assume.
And Vision Fund 2, here, just about 2 years since we launched, so last year to previous year those invested portfolios, they are still in a growth process so that many companies are showing the markdown. But at the same time, I believe that many of our portfolio company has a very firm fundamentals so that they have -- we would like to make sure that we have a good manage on those portfolio companies. And we have 472 companies invested and some of them increasing value, some of them decreasing in value. This is -- this shows that those that decrease in the shares are about 2/3 and about 1/4 of them are increasing in value, and the remaining is no change. So compared to the end of March, those with reducing the value which used to be 1/3 in end of March, but that is increasing about 2/3. That tells you how severe and difficult the environment is right now.
But at the same time, that we do see some companies that are increasing in value so that we would like to make sure that we can survive this moment together with all portfolio companies. And here, a gain and loss on investments, breaking down, what are the drivers for those that are increasing in value? And what are the drivers for those that are decreasing in value? Numbers, though the bars are too small, so that would be difficult to tell. But those 2 on your left is a relatively large driver. Recent transaction and the performance of portfolio companies, those are the main drivers for those that are marking up.
On your right-hand side, those that are marking down, mainly coming from public portfolio companies, and also public comparable companies, that's another reason for the markdown. And next to that is the performance of those portfolio companies. So we analyze those in detail so that we can manage how we can improve the management. And the invested amount wise, does, I mean telling this that we've been focused on defense, so the new investment activities for the second quarter only $0.3 billion, almost we have nothing that we have invested this quarter. Last year, first quarter was $15.6 billion. Second quarter was $14.1 billion. So last year, in the first half, only about $30 billion has been invested, almost JPY 4 trillion level of the investment was being made last year. And this year, about $2.5 billion as the first half. So it's about JPY 300 billion or so.
So our strategy is clearly shown in these numbers. So under such circumstance, IPO was very few in the first half. There are 3 IPOs, and 3 of them actually are making good return. At the time of IPO that there are some increase in share price, but later on, many of them are declining in the value share price because of -- due to the environment. But at the same time, there are many companies that are aiming for the IPO in the future. And once the market recovers and along with the situation, we believe that we'll be able to see better numbers in here.
In the meantime, there are 3 policies for the fund. So because we have invested JPY 5 trillion last year, and now that we are not even making much of the investments. So there are dynamic change from last year to this year, so that human resource -- size of human resource has to be slimmed down along with our activities situation so that we can make organizational efficiency. Also, we would like to be selective in terms of investments. So otherwise, we are not investing unless we find any special opportunities or any great opportunities. And also, at the same time that you would like to make an effort on enhancing the value of current portfolio.
And here, there are some changes in the leadership team for the fund, you may see on newspapers and so. But Rajeev Misra has been leading on fund. But he's -- now that they're making a new path for himself. So Vision Fund 1 is continuously chaired or the CEO is Mr. Rajeev Misra. And fund 2, he continuously served as Vice Chairman, but he is not going to be involved in any new investment activities for Vision Fund 2 because of the conflict of interest point of view. So as a new leadership, as you can see, in the United States and Latin America, Alex Clavel. Asia, Europe is Greg Moon and for the functional teams, Navneet, there that he's sitting here with us. So those 3 members are actually leading the team of the Vision Fund.
Now SoftBank Vision Fund sectors in focus. Of course, in general, markets are bad and situations are bad, but are really everything bad? We have not given up. We are looking at potential of future of invested companies. So again, let us remind you sectors in focus. The first, digital commerce. We have invested in many companies in this sector. As you can see, the worldwide retail e-commerce sales, the percentage increased from 7% to 24%. And it's going to be continued on this trend. And consumers want to have seamless digital first experiences. And they want to directly access online on their own. So again, the market will be more convenient and convened and it will be powered by AI.
Next sector, global supply chain. Let's say, automated warehouse which is one of our focuses, for example, AutoStore as one of the companies doing business in that sector. On the left-hand side, you can see automation market opportunity. Only 2% of the market is automated. 98%, unautomated, which has a great opportunity. Not only AI, but robotics should play a key role in the sector and the market, which is very attractive to us.
Next, Fintech or Financial Services. Financial Services will continue to grow with digital payment, neobanking and digital investments & assets, for example, that growth is clear by looking at the PayPay. And labor market, historically, hiring demand is so high. By leveraging AI, hiring processes, onboarding process can be transformed dramatically. And also employee engagements and employee retention should be helped by AI and big data. And also talent management is something that AI should help. And consequently, business can grow.
Last but not the least, data. How can we deliver data to those businesses? As you can see, data volume has been growing exponentially and AI's computing power, which is powered by ARM, is growing and capability to analyze a huge volume of data and protect and manage data are going to be very important in the society in the future, and that can present a business opportunity.
Those are the sectors in focus from Vision Fund perspective. Now let us pick up some portfolio companies from SBG's perspective, SBKK, Yahoo! Holding, those are public companies or they have their own financial results announcement. So I exclude them. So first, let me talk about ARM. Revenue-wise, it looks like 6% down year-on-year, but non-royalty revenues changed dramatically quarter-by-quarter. In the first quarter of last year, that number included revenue from 2 big transactions that happened before is excluding such onetime effect. The revenue of ARM for the first half of the year would have seen increase.
And as you can see, 3-year CAGR was 21%, and that's how Mr. Son is confident with ARM from a numbers perspective. Looking at adjusted EBITDA, 3-year compound annual growth rate was 107%. We have been talking with ARM to build strategy in the future, preparing for IPO in the future. So that kind of group-wide effort bears fruit. Market share, which I'm sure is familiar to you. ARM's chip business is what ARM is most good at. And ARM's chip is heavily used in mobile and IoT. And semiconductor will be used in every market. So that means ARM has a huge growth potential going forward.
In the second quarter, ARM announced Neoverse V2 and ARMv9 technology-based, now Neoverse V2 processor was really a positive news. And ARM's product are supported by major companies like NVIDIA and Intel. So those big companies have made announcements to adopt ARM's design, which is a very positive trend. ARM welcomed 3 Board members and also welcomed the new CFO, Jason Child, who has great experience and expertise and other new board members have a great ARM expertise and experience in their respective sectors, and they should provide ARM's management great advice.
Looking at Japan, let me talk about PayPay. Number of registered users, 51 million. PayPay has reaffirmed its strong position. GMV, JPY 1.8 trillion, continuous growth. They have been focusing on expanding GMV. And the next challenge for them is to increase profitability. Different data shows high visibility and presence. For example, they have a #1 position in QR code payment market in Japan, #1 position in most download app. And going forward, growth opportunity for PayPay can be seen in TAM or total addressable market, which is about JPY 250 trillion, TAM, JPY 250 trillion and PayPay's GMV is only JPY 4.9 trillion of JPY 250 trillion of TAM. PayPay's JPY 4.9 trillion and other payment companies have fewer GMV. So this TAM is the blue ocean.
And from a technology perspective and from a business model perspective, we are in a strong position to get the share of this huge market. When this is nothing new, something old, T-Mobile. So acquisition of Sprint was done in 2013. At the time of acquisition of Sprint, AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, those are the 3 big bells. And we, Sprint and T-Mobile, as you can see on your left-hand side, they are -- that was their level. And now actually changed the landscape and now T-Mobile is leading the situation. AT&T is already in #4 position.
Acquisition of Sprint, I had a difficult time for financing, but I didn't imagine we expected that AT&T come to this position. So I believe that this is a very competitive market. T-Mobile strategy is, I believe, is very appropriate at the time. And at the time of acquisition, JPY 2.1 trillion investment was made, but the equity portion was the JPY 0.4 trillion. Remainings were leveraged. So leverage has been already paid and equity value is now that increased to JPY 3 trillion. And also, IRR bites 25% because the time has passed since then. So it's not bad, not bad at all. So 1 time that the people said that the Sprint acquisition was failure, you made a mistake. And actually, we did experience and suffered at the time with Sprint. However, as a result, it led to the great return to us. So with many people's wisdom and power, we believe that we come to this way.
And last but not least, financial strategy. We always announce our financial strategy in the beginning of the period, and there is no change for that. We always like to keep our words once we commit to the market. And on top of that, that we ask Masa to freely manage the business. But at the same time environment changed, market changed, so that we try to do what we can do based on our financial strategy. And so that we have no change on our strategy, just to reconfirm with you that these are the 3 financial policy, loan-to-value maintaining that below 25% in normal times and also maintain at least 2 years' worth of bond redemption in cash and secure recurring distributions and dividend income from Vision Fund 1 and 2 and other subsidiaries, so we would like to make sure these policies and, of course, under such market and circumstance, we would like to keep the defensive mode. But at the same time, we believe that there are -- we would be able to see the dawn of the recovery sometime later so that we are looking forward to the time to come and we would like to make sure that we keep the day to day.
And that's all from me. And now that we would like to open the floor to the questions. So Masa actually answers all the questions by himself, but I am not that capable, so that we have Ms. Kimiwada. She has a long history in SoftBank than me, and we have Navneet. He's been with us at the Vision Fund supporting Rajeev from the inception of the fund. And Ian, he's been working with us since the acquisition of ARM. So after privatized ARM, that he's been actually supporting the company from the Investor Relations point of view. So we have a great member actually ready for you.
So if you have any questions, please let us know.
[Interpreted] Now we'd like to take questions. First, we'd like to take questions from the floor. [Operator Instructions] We are starting from the floor now. [Operator Instructions].
[Interpreted] Maschio from Nikkei business. Two questions. First, you mentioned the long winter or market environment. What's your outlook for market environment in the next 12 months or next year for mid and long term? When do you expect market will be recovered? Do you think this year is the bottom or next year, we will see another bottom? So first, what's your view on market environment in the new year?
The second, impact on your finance from Alibaba shares. You posted a remeasurement gain. But going forward, what kind of impact Alibaba share or contract or settlement will have on PL? When you sell Alibaba shares, of course, it has an impact on cash. But what kind of impact when you sell Alibaba shares on P&L? If you keep holding on Alibaba shares, what kind of impact should we expect on PL? And how could you clarify?
[Interpreted] Thank you very much for your questions. Maybe I will ask Kimiwada-san to answer the second question. The first, our outlook for the market. And if we have a crystal ball, that would be great. But to be honest with you, we don't know when we hit the bottom. But in the last 1 month or so, we are beginning to see the positive change. For example, IPO market, it looks like getting improved. Companies like mobile aisle tried IPO recently. But basically, we are pessimistic about the market environment. Why? Because like I mentioned, in the presentation geopolitical risks are still there. Until we see the light at the end of the tunnel, we can't expect a positive outlook in the market. We don't have to be rushed and we want to wait for a good timing.
[Interpreted] And about your second question, Alibaba shares, if you look at the second -- excuse me 12th page, Page 12, and minus JPY 1.1 trillion at the bottom, it says. It's FVTPL valuation loss. The measurement took place in the middle of second quarter. And at the end of second quarter, we valued the fair value because it's FVTPL investment every quarter, we mark fair value every quarter. When the market gets better, we see positive. When markets get bad, we see negative. If we were to sell Alibaba shares, the difference between the share price we sold and the price at the end of the latest quarter. That's how you see.
[Interpreted] Any other questions? So a person in the center with gray jacket.
[Interpreted] Yamauchi from Manage News. FDX, I believe that the digital fund is investing in FDX. And what is the impact for your results? And also, for the second question, any possibility of management buyout? There are some rumors by analysts. Is there any possibility for that?
[Interpreted] About FDX, I've been seeing such news for the past couple of days. And we have invested in FDX related to companies about $100 million or so from Vision Fund. That's compared with the total amount of investment, very minor. If, any case of markdown, but still that it is very -- not material for us. And about your second -- and in addition to that, cryptocurrencies is something that we are very small in terms of investing in such cryptocurrency related. And for your reference, I was biggest against person for this current cryptocurrency investments in the company.
Investing in AI is the vision for the Vision Fund. So the investing in currency is actually a bit different from our vision. So that's something that we need to see seriously. But through the business of cryptocurrency, there may be something that comes to the technology evolution like blockchain. That can be a positive for AI. So there can be some interpretations to make an investment and including some indirect of those, but still just about 1.3% of the Vision Fund overall. So for cryptocurrency that I am still not for the idea. No change for that. That's for the first question.
And for your second question, MBO. I have no comments for that. No change for that answer.
Next question?
[Interpreted] Nakagawa from News Peaks. Two questions. First, you talked about resizing of SVF like 150 people out of 500, for example. How are you restructuring SVF from a human resource perspective? And related question, when market bounces back, you may want to be able to restart investment through Vision Fund. But investment company or venture capital, you have to continue investing to get information for going and to keep network. As we have to and later, maybe you may want to invest in early stage companies going forward? So what's your view on future investment by SVF?
[Interpreted] Navneet, could you talk about that?
So to your first question about reduction in the staff for the Vision Funds, so as has been reported in some of the media outlets, the reduction was more than 30%. And in terms of early stage, at the right time at the attractive valuations, we will continue to look at investing in companies that leverage artificial intelligence. That's the focus. We look at the most disruptive technology companies that leverage artificial intelligence. Thank you.
[Interpreted] Thank you. Any other questions? Third row from me, a gentleman.
[Interpreted] Matsuda from Nikkei newspaper. ARM IPO. My question is about ARM IPO. So semiconductor market is in difficulties and the world shortage is also going forward. In the financial report, also that indicates that there may be some slowdown of growth depending on the market. But before that you mentioned that fiscal '22 is a kind of target for the IPO timing. Do you have any change of the schedule and also why?
[Interpreted] It's in preparation for IPO, so I would like to ask Ian to answer that to make sure.
Thank you for your question. Clearly, we want to IPO as soon as is possible. But as Masa and Goto-san indicated earlier, given the current global economic uncertainty, given the state of the financial markets, that's probably now unlikely to happen in this fiscal year, so unlikely to happen before the end of March 2023. However, the preparations for the IPO are going very well. They're advanced. And we are fully committed to IPOing sometime in 2023, in calendar '23.
[Interpreted] As explained by Ian, SoftBank Group has no change in our explanation about that, too. Once the market is ready, of course, sooner is better, but this is a great company, great asset, so that we would like to make sure that we have a great preparation in the market. That is why we don't have to rush. We don't have to switch. So that we think that sometime in year of 2023. Thank you. Any other questions from the floor?
[Interpreted] Dee from Bloomberg. First, you mentioned that practically, you hold investment for now. But what's your position to the Chinese market? About the headcount reduction, about 30%. Is that the end of the entire restructuring? Or is there more to come in the future?
[Interpreted] Thank you. The first question, maybe Navneet may add to my answer. But again, yes, investment-wise, in general, we put on hold. But the assets in China, we are more careful than before. I refrain from commenting on politics in China, for example, back assets that we have in China have been damaged. That's the fact. So for some time, our Chinese assets may suffer from uncertainties. That's why whenever an opportunity for monetization, we will do. When it comes to new investments, again, we continue to be more careful than before. And the second question, Navneet, you may want to answer to the second question.
With respect to the reductions, as has been reported, it has been greater than 30%. We believe we have now rightsized the organization to support our more than 470 portfolio companies. And given the defensive posture that we have, and at the right time, when we see attractive investment opportunities at the correct valuations, we will be able to pursue them with the team we have at least.
[Interpreted] Thank you very much. For the interest of time, I just like to have a last question from the floor. So there is from front row, gentleman, please.
[Interpreted] Nagoshi from NHK. I have 2 questions, please. In the presentation, efficiency of the organization has also been discussed. So in the previous earnings, that no secrets, but the cost reduction is going to be pursued. But is that going to be the same policy? Any specific policies or ideas for the reductions? And as for Masa, I have second question about Masa. So in his explanation that he's going to delegate some of authority to somebody else, but -- so that is he going to be involved? Is he not going to be involved in the management as a CEO? Is he not going to touch on any management of the business at all?
[Interpreted] So let me come from your second question regarding Masa. And for the first question about the efficiency of the organization, Navneet, would you please answer that?
So for the second one, Masa, as the Chairman and CEO, he -- no change on that. He's going to be involved. But we also need to do more better because we've been asking Masa too much probably to do many things. But we, in each our expertise that we need to actually have the role. So he's going to be supervising as a Group CEO to see new supervisor role, but also as an entrepreneur that he develop and grow the business. So he's been doing 2 roles.
So especially for the functional portion, me, myself and Kimiwada-san's team is going to look after. And each group company, they have their own management team. And for those public companies and public, they already have their own independent guidance. For those private like Vision Fund, for example, those is something even not a public company, but try to be close -- work as an independent body and try to enhance the governance. So Navneet, please go for the first question.
So with respect to the efficiency of the organization and the reductions, when we made the reductions, those were across all levels, senior levels, junior levels, middle management levels, and they were across all geographies. The other thing we did was SoftBank's operations outside of Japan, we brought them under a single platform, One SoftBank.
So we had SoftBank International, we have the Vision Funds. We have now combined them and they are operated as One SoftBank team. So for all the functional areas like finance, legal, human resources and others, they are single teams outside of Japan, supporting each of the investing teams like the investing teams for Vision Fund 1, Vision Fund 2, the LatAm funds. So there is significant efficiency as a result of these organizational changes that we made.
[Interpreted] Thank you very much. Now we would like to take questions from Zoom participants. [Operator Instructions] Nakajima-san from [ Kyoto Suchin ]?
[Interpreted] My name is Nakajima from [ Kyoto Suchin ]. I have a question about Son-san's remarks. He mentioned that this time, it was the last, which surprised me. I thought that he would show himself next time and onwards, but it seems today was the last. Going forward, maybe shareholders' meeting is the only forum where we can see Masa's face. So maybe Masa's remarks won't be picked by media, for example, not so much compared to -- from before. So that could have a negative impact to you, but even though there are some disadvantage of Masa not showing up as frequently as before, still, he decided or you decided to have him focused on ARM.
[Interpreted] Thank you very much for your question. Of course, we took into consideration of some disadvantage. But if you listen to what Masa said carefully, yes, he will lead AGM and also he mentioned that he might show himself when he thought he would have to do. But for like results announcement, our job is to communicate with you the fact, which we will continue to do. I think eventually, by releasing him from the efforts on earnings results announcement, for example, he should be able to have more time and efforts into his real focus. But at some point, I'm sure he'll be happy to show his face to you, and we are looking forward to that opportunity. Thank you.
[Interpreted] Next question from the Zoom participants. Masuno-san from Nomura Securities.
[Interpreted] Yes. This is Masuno. I have 2 questions. First is about Alibaba. At the end of September, Alibaba forward contract, so looking at the financial report end of September, less than 1 year or over 1 year, you have JPY 2.8 trillion of Alibaba forward. And I don't know how that's going to be addressed, but I believe that depending -- as long as we see some steadiness of the Alibaba share price, you may be able to settle in shares and repay, you don't need to repay in cash. How do you see that? That's my first question.
[Interpreted] As you say, this transaction is basically trying to have a hedge. So when share price goes down, we have already -- we can settle with the agreed share price so that when we see the decline in share price, we believe that we have more positive benefit by settling in shares. By having the option, we'll be able to be flexible when the share price is volatile. So that's the kind of the benefit that we try to keep it with us.
[Interpreted] And my second question is the stand-alone cash runway. So excluding the credit lines, JPY 3.6 trillion at the end of March. So buybacks and shares and buyback of bonds, you have spent JPY 800 billion. So JPY 3.5 trillion less those that it's going to give you JPY 2.8 trillion. Bonds that you keep cash equivalents to 2-year bond redemptions, that gives you JPY 1.9 trillion. But if you try to keep more than that, then JPY 2.8 trillion is going to be necessary to reserve for the bond redemptions or any -- otherwise, that you cannot have any excess for the share buyback or the coverage for the debt. How long years that would you like to keep as a cash for the debt service? How do you see the balance in between the cash position and the financial policy?
[Interpreted] So our financial policy is maintaining our cash to cover at least 2-year bond redemption. And that because historically, at the time of Lehman bankruptcy, how long did the market closed, and those are the kind of data and I believe 2 years of the bond coverage is more than enough. So that's the base for our financial policy. And for the second half and the next fiscal year, there are several financing plan that are with us. So being defensive and seeing such circumstance, if the financing plan is something acceptable for the counterpart in the market, then that I believe that that's going to be executed. And that is, I believe, gives us more than enough of the cash position.
[Interpreted] So in that case, you may increase the debt, but you have a cash position so that net does not really worried?
[Interpreted] If we divest the asset then that's going to be even positive. So if you settle in shares for the Alibaba contract, then I believe that, that's also positive for you.
[Interpreted] In the interest of time, this was the last question. Thank you, Goto-san. This concludes the SoftBank Group Corporation earnings results briefing for the 6 months period ended September 30, 2022. The video footage of the session will be uploaded on our corporate website. Thank you once again very much for joining the SoftBank Group Corp. earnings results briefing for 6-month period ended September 30, 2022.
[Portions of this transcript that are marked [Interpreted] were spoken by an interpreter present on the live call.]