SoftBank's trimming of US$109b debt leaves funds wary of Son

Tokyo

SOFTBANK Group Corp's move to sell assets and reduce its US$109 billion in total debt has some bondholders wary of the risk founder Masayoshi Son will use the cash for another acquisition.

The mobile phone and Internet group said on Thursday it will sell US$8.9 billion of its stake in Chinese e-commerce company Alibaba Group Holding Ltd to boost cash and reduce liabilities. While SoftBank's 2020 dollar bonds have rallied to a three-year high and its bond risk more than halved in the past four months, it still has about 0.4 per cent chance of non-payment in the coming year, based on the Bloomberg Default-Risk Model.