A familiar name can be found at the top of Institutional Investor’s 2023 All-Japan Trading Team: Nomura Securities Co.
The domestic firm is recognized as the No. 1 provider based on the views of buy-side traders and other investment professionals who rated their top trading and execution teams across four main categories: electronic trading, high-touch sales trading, portfolio/program trading, and Delta One/ETF.
Nomura also topped II’s corporate access survey and made top-five appearances in both the research and sales rankings. Gael Vasseur, head of global execution services in Japan for the firm, credited the bank’s overall culture and team of people as a differentiating factor in a competitive field that includes other domestic and global firms.
“Our people and unique culture are our best assets,” Vasseur said. “A team of talented people who are committed to our clients in the long term is key to providing high quality services and differentiating ourselves. This focus on long-term partnership drives our strategy and investments in technology, platforms, services, and innovation.”
The trading environment remained challenging in over the past year. Clients’ main concerns continued to revolve around liquidity as it drives market risk and execution cost, according to Vasseur, who reported that the Nomura has been focused on liquidity provision solutions for many years.
“We operate dark pools globally via our global execution services, and have leading market share in the space in Japan,” he said. “Our NX Kozan product in Japan and Block Cross platform that we are rolling out in Asia are innovative products that aim at addressing this need for various types of liquidity.”
Following Nomura on the top five leaderboard for overall trading and execution services was Daiwa Securities Group, which also topped the All-Japan Research Team and All-Japan Sales Team. JPMorgan Chase & Co. placed third, while Mizuho Securities and Goldman Sachs placed fourth and fifth, respectively.
