As global uncertainties continued to mount in 2022, investors in the Japanese markets were forced to navigate a rocky road.
“Clearly, the markets the past year have been characterized by a fairly unstable market environment, including inflationary pressures, upward pressure on interest rates, rising geopolitical and military tensions, currency volatility, and monetary tightening,” said Takaaki Muramatsu, director of research at SMBC Nikko Securities.
Hidekatsu Watanabe, head of the equity research department at Mizuho Securities Co., confirmed that as pandemic-related restrictions receded in 2022, macroeconomic and geopolitical obstacles replaced them. “The outlook on equities had been comparatively bullish in anticipation of an economic reopening after the Covid-19 outbreak, but rising U.S. interest rates, the war in Ukraine, and lockdowns in China led to more political, economic, and financial challenges than expected,” he said.
What has this volatility meant for the country’s research analysts and offerings? “For sell-side research in Japan, this challenging combination of market factors for the investor increases the value of the capability of companies like ours to produce and deliver high-quality research to enhance investment performance for our clients,” said SMBC Nikko’s Muramatsu.
Voters in Institutional Investor’s 30th annual ranking of Japan research teams appear to value not only the capabilities but the consistency of the country’s domestic firms....
To select the members of our 30th annual 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 over 1,000 individuals at 432 firms.
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 to create the Commission-weighted leader rankings. The same scores were weighted by each voting firm’s Japanese equity assets under management to produce the AUM-weighted rankings.
Using these scores, ranks were determined. Firms/analysts were designated runners‐up when their scores came within 35 percent of the third-place scores. For the analyst rankings, the cut-off date for individuals is the date of the survey opening (8th November 2022).
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 and Associate Project Manager Katie MacDougall.