Nomura once again ranks as Japan’s top equity research provider — but this year, it’s not alone. The incumbent shares the honor with another domestic firm: Daiwa Securities Group.
Together, the two Tokyo-based firms lead Institutional Investor’s 2020 All-Japan Research Team. More than 800 investment professionals across 365 firms voted in the 27th annual survey, rating research providers across 29 industry sectors and three macro disciplines. For the second year, the scores were weighted by how much respondents paid in Japanese equity commissions, in order to better reflect evolving research spending.
Daiwa — which placed fourth in last year’s commission-weighted ranking — improved significantly this year, racking up 28 total team positions to match Nomura. Mizuho Securities, which ranked second in 2019, came in third place this year with 25 team positions. Despite being bumped down the leaderboard, Mizuho once again earned the most first-team positions of any provider, ranking first in eight sectors. Daiwa and Nomura, meanwhile, were each awarded six first-team positions.
Additional leaderboards reflect votes for individual analysts, as well as responses weighted by assets under management.
To select the members of our 27th annual All‐Japan Research Team, Institutional Investor solicited opinions of directors of research and heads of investment firms with major securities holdings in Japan. We received responses from more than 826 individuals at 365 firms. The names of individuals surveyed are kept confidential to ensure their continuing cooperation.
This year, participants rated their top firms in each sector and then separately rated individual analysts or economists/strategists at those firms to create two distinct rankings for each sector. A numerical score was produced by weighting each vote by the respondent’s Japanese equity commissions and the average rating awarded. The same scores were weighted by each voting firm’s Japanese equity assets under management to produce the AUM-weighted rankings.
Using those scores, ranks were determined. Firms/analysts were designated runners‐up when their scores came within 35 percent of the third-place scores.
The individuals surveyed are kept confidential to ensure continuing cooperation. Voters are subject to eligibility requirements, and winners must achieve a minimum vote count. All ballots are subject to review by our Research Operations Group.
These results were compiled by Senior Project Manager Tucker Ewing, along with Associates Xiao Lu and Michael Clemons.