SoftBank plans longer debt to replace $40 billion bridge loan

The Japanese tech group aims to clear the short-term facility used to back its stake in OpenAI

SoftBank Group will repay the outstanding balance of a $40 billion bridge loan secured to fund its equity stake in OpenAI, moving to refinance the short-term borrowing with longer-term debt instruments.¹²

The move addresses the single largest element of debt financing assembled behind the artificial intelligence developer. SoftBank secured the original 12-month bridge facility in March to finance an aggressive balance-sheet expansion into OpenAI, establishing one of the largest bridge credit packages ever completed in the Asia-Pacific region.²

The initial debt package carried terms designed to hold the investment while managers organized a wider pool of participants. Arranging banks structured the financing to yield more than $100 million in underwriting fees, reflecting the sheer scale of the balance sheet commitment required to underwrite $40 billion in corporate debt for a single transaction.²

SoftBank founder and chief executive Masayoshi Son has committed to go all in on OpenAI, building financial pledges that now exceed $60 billion.² The scale of that exposure required bridging capital while longer-term capital market arrangements were prepared.

Before moving toward a full debt replacement, the facility underwent multiple syndication steps across global credit markets. The facility attracted nine new participating banks before entering general syndication in May, followed by a broader distribution wave during the summer.²

In that broader syndication phase, the bridge facility brought in an additional syndicate of 21 lenders, who collectively took down roughly $7 billion of the total commitment.² Underwriters calculated the participant tally at the parent level because several international institutions entered the syndicate through multiple regional branches.²

Sovereign and commercial institutions took leading positions within that syndicated slice. First Abu Dhabi Bank, Singapore sovereign fund GIC, and Standard Chartered Bank each absorbed positions of nearly $1 billion, according to people familiar with the transaction who spoke on condition of anonymity.² The remaining commitments within that $7 billion package were allocated among a network of European, Japanese, and Taiwanese commercial lenders.²

Following that round of syndication, the remaining $33 billion balance remained on the books of the original underwriters and senior syndicate managers.² Credit distribution of this type commonly leaves initial underwriters seeking further syndication or structured debt refinancing to reduce concentration risks on their own balance sheets.

The underlying debt terms imposed meaningful carry costs during the months the loan remained open. Pricing terms on the bridge agreement set an initial interest margin of about 250 basis points over the Secured Overnight Financing Rate, which produced an effective borrowing rate of 6.14% under prevailing benchmark rate levels in July.²

Those interest expenses mounted alongside questions among debt syndicate officers about concentration risk. Several participating bankers expressed caution regarding the sheer scale of SoftBank's financial reliance on OpenAI, particularly as the model developer confronted intensifying product and commercial competition from industry rivals such as Anthropic.²

OpenAI completed a funding round in March that established an equity valuation of $852 billion, and the company took steps toward a public equity offering by submitting an initial public listing filing in June.² Those equity benchmarks provided the structural valuation underpinning SoftBank's investment decisions, even as the holding company relied on short-term bank financing to execute its initial cash transfers.

By initiating the repayment and refinancing process, SoftBank shifts its financing structure away from temporary floating-rate bank lines toward fixed-duration obligations. Replacing short-term bank facilities with longer-dated debt instruments gives the company room to manage its liquidity profile without confronting an immediate maturity cliff on the $40 billion package.

Reporting note: this piece draws on reporting by Kari Lindberg in The Japan Times and financial disclosures reported by Bloomberg on September 9, 2026. The Primary news team conducted no interviews for this report.

Source: Bloomberg, September 9, 2026

References

This article is based on 2 sources, listed in the order they are cited.

1. 1 B bloomberg.com announcement · 9 Sep 2026 SoftBank to Repay $40 Billion Bridge Loan Used for OpenAI Stake See the source
2. 2 TJ The Japan Times third party · 27 Jul 2026 SoftBank’s $40 billion loan for OpenAI stake gets 21 new lenders See the source