Softbank once offered Jensen Huang a loan to buy Nvidia entirely — Nvidia CEO regrets not taking the loan

At Nvidia’s AI Summit in Tokyo this week, Jensen Huang, chief executive of Nvidia, and Masayoshi Son, the head of SoftBank, expressed regrets that the former did not privatize Nvidia a decade ago when the latter offered him money to do so. As a result, the two companies have failed to merge and create an AI and supercomputer giant with CPU and GPU prowess, reports Fortune. 

At the event, the two executives discussed three critical attempts to strengthen ties, from privatization to a potential merger with Arm, which regulators stopped.

“Masa said, ‘Jensen, the market doesn’t understand the value of Nvidia. Your future is incredible,” said Huang. “‘Your journey of suffering will continue for some time, so let me give you the money to buy Nvidia.’ He wanted to lend me money to buy Nvidia, all of it. Now I regret not taking it.”

Masayoshi Son remembered that this happened one month after he acquired Arm sometime in 2016. Apparently, this is when Huang and Son talked about combining the two companies into a powerhouse that could address virtually everything from smartphones to PCs and from mainstream servers to AI machines and supercomputers.

Buying Nvidia stock on the open market in 2016 would be much harder than buying the same stock in 2014 – 2015. According to CompaniesMarketCap.com, the company’s capitalization in 2014 was $10.89 billion, grew to $17.73 billion in 2015, and skyrocketed to $57.53 billion in 2016. 

Jensen Huang also reminded Masayoshi Son that he bought Nvidia stock on the open market after 2016 but sold his shares before Nvidia’s stock skyrocketed in 2023 – 2024. Today, Nvidia’s market capitalization is $3.606 trillion, making it the most valuable company in the world by market cap.

The conversation captures their mixed emotions — nostalgia for the bold ideas they once entertained and a sense of loss as they see what might have been achieved. Jensen’s teasing highlights how Nvidia’s explosive growth has made these missed opportunities even more poignant, emphasizing how foresight and timing are crucial in the fast-moving tech industry.