U.S. Sovereign Wealth Fund On Pause, But White House Mulls Shared Fund With Japan

A plan for a U.S. sovereign wealth fund was put on indefinite hold by the Trump administration late last week, but it could soon be back on track as a shared fund with Japan.

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said President Donald Trump had set an American plan aside for now because he is “laser-focused” on paying down the national debt during a Friday interview with Bloomberg Television.

Meanwhile, SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son has suggested to Bessent that the U.S. join forces with Japan for a joint sovereign wealth fund to support technology and infrastructure investments, The Financial Times reported. Son's joint fund plan isn't yet a formal proposal, though it has been discussed among prominent government figures in the U.S. and Japan

Trump signed an executive order in February directing Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick to deliver an outline for a U.S. sovereign wealth fund, including recommendations for funding mechanisms, investment strategies, fund structure and a governance model.

However, Trump officials were reportedly unhappy with portions of the delivered proposal. White House officials kept the proposal from getting to Trump and pivoted to a more streamlined investment approach, Bloomberg reported. 

Sovereign wealth funds are typically major investors in commercial real estate and have grown in prominence in CRE circles since the 2008 financial crisis.

Son's proposal for a joint fund would be owned and operated by the U.S. Treasury and Japan's Ministry of Finance, with each government having a significant stake. Limited partner investors, including regular citizens of the two nations, could then be allowed to buy in. 

To realize the investment ambitions set forth for such a joint fund, starting capital would need to be in the neighborhood of $300B, The Financial Times reported. The plan could create a new revenue stream without raising U.S. taxes while also setting up a stable investment framework for Japanese officials.

The two countries are amid negotiations to lower U.S. tariffs on Japan, with Japanese Prime Minister Shigeru Ishiba saying his planned meeting with Trump at the G7 summit next month could be a “milestone” in those talks, the FT reported.

Son has ties to Trump and is reportedly interested in a role in directing investments for the potential joint fund. The two appeared at the White House together in January to announce SoftBank's $500B joint venture with Oracle and OpenAI called Stargate, which plans to build data centers and artificial intelligence infrastructure in the U.S.

Stargate just secured an $11.6B financing deal for the second phase of its 1.2-gigawatt data center campus in Abilene, Texas.