Huge losses at SoftBank’s flagship Vision Funds will force the company to begin “dramatic” cost-cutting after plunging technology valuations and a weak yen drove Masayoshi Son’s embattled conglomerate into a record ¥3.1tn ($23bn) quarterly net loss.

In a press conference that Son himself described as “depressing”, he admitted that his famously aggressive global investment strategy should have been more selective, adding: “I am ashamed of myself for being so elated by big profits in the past.”