The post-holiday and pre-New Year's period is typically a sleepy time for most stocks. However, Digital Bridge Group (DBRG +9.63%) was not one of those stocks as 2025 came to a close. On Monday, the company's share price surged almost 10% higher after news of a buyout from a strategic investor hit the headlines.
$4 billion reasons to buy the stock
In a joint press release, DigitalBridge and SoftBank Group divulged that the latter has agreed to acquire the former. The total enterprise value of the deal is roughly $4 billion, the two companies wrote.
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DigitalBridge is a supplier of digital infrastructure, which includes the hardware used to construct and equip data centers. This is currently a hot area of investment, as the high demand for artificial intelligence (AI) requires either the construction of new facilities that can handle the increased resource needs of the technology or upgrades to existing buildings.
In the press release, the companies quoted SoftBank founder and CEO Masayoshi Son as saying that "this acquisition will strengthen the foundation for next-generation AI data centers, advance our vision to become a leading Artificial Super Intelligence (ASI) platform provider, and help unlock breakthroughs that move humanity forward."
NYSE: DBRG
Key Data Points
A skeptical market
Under the terms of the deal, SoftBank is to pay $16 per DigitalBridge share in cash. The latter company's stock closed Monday at $15.26, quite a bit south of that price. This suggests some skepticism among investors that the acquisition will be completed as agreed upon.
It's likely that many of those folks remember SoftBank's involvement in once-hot coworking company WeWork, which ended when a $3 billion tender offer to its stockholders was terminated by the Asia-based tech investment company.
However, the DigitalBridge deal is smaller in scale, and it's for a company that's both reliably profitable and operates in a sustainably strong corner of the tech infrastructure market. I'm confident the deal will go through, and investors can still take advantage of the disparity between DigitalBridge's current price and what Softbank is offering.
