Swiggy, FirstCry Boost SoftBank Q1 Gains; Ola Electric Slips

Food delivery startup Swiggy and omnichannel retailer FirstCry were the best Indian actors in the SoftBank Vision Fund portfolio in the April June quarter with contributions almost amounting to $ 160 million of unrealized investment gain.

Swiggy was the first one to show a rise in fair value, as the value of its stock rose by 21 percent in the quarter to end up at $139 million. FirstCry increased the books of SoftBank by another 20 million after a 5 percent increase in its share price as indicated in the last earnings presentation made by the investment banker. The Japanese investor owned Swiggy and holds about 800 million and FirstCry worth 500 million as of June.

Key Highlights

• Swiggy and FirstCry add $160M to SoftBank's India portfolio gains in Q1.
• Ola Electric sees 22 percent drop, continuing valuation slump for SoftBank.
• SoftBank shifts focus to global AI bets as Indian startups see mixed returns.

The increase is a change of direction when compared to the past quarter when the two companies dented Vision Fund returns. During the March quarter, the shares of Swiggy dropped by almost 40 percent and SoftBank has incurred a notional loss of over 424 million dollars. Stock of FirstCry, also declined by a sharp margin of 43 percent though SoftBank did not draw any specifics about the degree of markdown to its books in its March quarter earnings.

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As far as it goes, these losses and markups exist only on paper, and SoftBank has not sold or reduced its positions in both businesses. Ola Electric, another marquee India bet, experienced a decline in stock price of more than 22 percent during June quarter. The fall amounted to an unaccounted loss of some tens of millions of dollars although the company had similarly fallen in the March quarter where the exact amount of its impact was not brought out as part of the SoftBank report.

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In Q1 FY25, SoftBank realized a 421.83-billion-yen ($2.87 billion) profit, with the Vision Fund profits amounting to 726.83 billion yen ($4.94 billion). As far as its earnings skyrocketed, its recent calls have been on AI bets such as OpenAI and Perplexity with no mention of India.