Softbank Sells 72.2% Stake In Supercell For About $7.8 Billion In Proceeds

Softbank Group Corp. said Tuesday it has agreed to sell its 72.2% stake in Finnish mobile game company Supercell Oy to China's Tencent Holdings Ltd. for about $7.3 billion in cash, plus a special dividend of about $0.4 billion. The implied valuation of Supercell's equity is about $10.2 billion, the Japanese software company said in a statement. Softbank said total returns on its investment in Supercell amount to about $8.4 billion, or 2.9 times capital invested and a 93% internal rate of return. The decision to sell the stake "is driven by (Softbank's) continued focus on disciplined capital allocation, including further deleveraging, as part of its SoftBank 2.0 transformation strategy," said the statement.