Softbank tycoon who met with Trump is Japan’s deal maker

Trump appeared in the lobby of the Trump Tower on Tuesday with Masayoshi Son, the chief executive of SoftBank, to announce the news.

Donald Trump embarked Tuesday on the second leg of an unorthodox “victory tour”, promising tough policies to put the USA economy first and boasting of securing a US$50 billion Japanese investment to create 50,000 jobs.

The $50 billion will come from an earlier announced $100 billion worldwide investment fund Son is launching with Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund and other potential partners, according to Dow Jones.

Speaking to reporters after his meeting with Trump, Son said that he expects the new administration will eliminate many existing regulations. All Son said was the new jobs would come from investments in us startups.

SoftBank controls Sprint, but it’s unclear if the $50 billion would include new investments in the company. Using his medium of choice, the president-elect was quick to tweet that the deal would have never come to fruition had he not won the November 8 election. Quite possibly, yeah. SoftBank owns 80 percent of Sprint; they’ve been trying to acquire T-Mobile for years now.

SoftBank took a major share in cellular network operator Sprint Corp. a few years ago.

“He’s been talking about this for well over two years”, Kuehl said.

And although the news of $50 billion dollars in investments is being cheered as an economic victory, Donald Trump offered no specifics on how that investment would be made. SoftBank owns more than 235 companies and more than 100 affiliates.

Donald Trump’s efforts to become “the greatest jobs president that God ever created”, or at least to maintain the illusion of fighting for U.S.jobs, continues.

While neither Trump nor Son may worry too much about the facts, it’s clear someone will be writing checks that can’t be cashed.

In a bid to recapture some of that ground, SoftBank tried to buy T-Mobile, Sprint’s largest rival in the USA, but the deal was blocked by U.S. regulators.

Making friends with Trump early on could make it easier for SoftBank to sign large telco deals in the USA in the future.

For starters, the $50 billion investment is not coming directly from SoftBank, but rather the SoftBank Vision Fund which was already announced in October.

The Tokyo-listed firm jumped more than five percent after the opening bell, hours after the tycoon announced the deal, while wrapping an arm around SoftBank’s flamboyant billionaire founder Masayoshi Son. “He is one of the great men of industry”.

Arora had been criticized by investors for start-up investments as debt from the 2013 Sprint acquisition and slowing profit growth hampered SoftBank.