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SoftBank Group—Masayoshi Son pledged $100 billion US investment at Mar-a-Lago with Trump, doubling 2016 pledge that never delivered promised jobs

→ Trump Administration (2025-) · · $100.0B

On December 16, 2024, SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son appeared with President-elect Donald Trump at Mar-a-Lago to announce a $100 billion US investment pledge over Trump's term, promising 100,000 AI and infrastructure jobs. This doubled Son's 2016 pledge of $50 billion and 50,000 jobs made after Trump's first election - commitments where the money was eventually spent but it remains unclear whether the jobs were created. Analysts described this as 'SoftBank's version of an inaugural donation, in pursuit of a lighter regulatory touch for the firm and its portfolio companies' including its stake in TikTok parent ByteDance. SoftBank spent $2.68 million on US lobbying in 2024.

Scoring Impact

TopicDirectionRelevanceContribution
Regulatory Capture+towardprimary-1.00
Overall incident score =-0.750

Score = avg(topic contributions) × significance (high ×1.5) × confidence (0.50)

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