· Reports suggest that there's a possibility that SoftBank and Arm could opt for a dual-listing again
· CEO Masayoshi Son made the announcement after a $40 billion deal with Nvidia fell through
Japan's SoftBank plans to list semiconductor chip manufacturer Arm Holdings, on New York's tech-focused NASDAQ stock market, within the fiscal year ending March 31, 2023.
"The U.S., that's the market that we are looking at when it comes to listing Arm, and most likely Nasdaq," Softbank's CEO Masayoshi Son said in a press briefing Tuesday. "But wherever it is, the U.S. is the market that we're looking at for the listing of Arm."
Fallout with Nvidia
Son made the announcement after the $40 billion deal with Nvidia (NASDAQ: NVDA) fell through, sparking a political and corporate battle over the future home of Arm Holdings.
"I believe that Arm is about to enter its golden age, and so deep down I would rather avoid this sale as much as possible," SoftBank chief executive Masayoshi Son said on Tuesday evening. Softbank had spent 18 months working to offload the company to Nvidia.
In a joint statement issued on Tuesday, the two companies cited "significant regulatory challenges" as the reason for abandoning the deal.
Nvidia had announced a $40 billion cash-and-stock deal in September 2020 to buy influential chip designer Arm from Japanese owner Softbank. Regulators and chip-making rivals raised questions regarding the proposed deal.
London's listing concerns
Arm was dual-listed in London and New York up until 2016, when SoftBank bought it for $32 billion. At that time, the U.K. government welcomed the sale, but with the ongoing chip shortage, it was reluctant to see the semiconductor firm in the hands of an overseas company or listed on an overseas stock market.
The U.S. government wants its biggest tech companies to be solely listed on the London market. However, the numbers prompted numbers companies to sell across the Atlantic.
The most valuable tech companies on the Nasdaq, including Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL), Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT), Amazon (NYSE: AMZN), and Alphabet (NYSE: GOOG), have a market value of over $1 trillion. Meanwhile, the most valuable tech firms on the London Stock Exchange are all valued at less than $50 billion.
CNBC reported that there's a possibility that SoftBank and Arm could opt for a dual-listing again, although a final decision hasn't been made.
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