Nomura seeks US fund management acquisitions as part of global expansion

By Anton Bridge

TOKYO, May 29 (Reuters) – Japan’s Nomura Holdings is looking for acquisition targets for its investment management business in the U.S. to build on last year’s $1.8 billion buyout of Macquarie’s U.S. and European public asset management businesses, its chief executive said on Friday.

“Having made this large U.S. investment, we’re in the market for companies or divisions with products that complement it,” Kentaro Okuda, chief executive of Japan’s largest investment bank and brokerage, told its annual investor briefing.

The Macquarie acquisition was Nomura’s largest since it acquired assets of Lehman Brothers after the latter collapsed in 2008, however it later wrote these down.

Okuda’s comments reflect both Nomura’s long-held ambition to establish itself as a global player as well as demonstrating the progress it has made in building out its global footprint.

GROWTH PLANS

“Abroad we are seen as a global company, but in Japan people see us as a domestic firm,” Okuda said. “We want to communicate to the general public and especially our customers in Japan, what kind of work we do and how much profit we are generating globally,” he added.

Having booked record profits over the last two years, Nomura on Thursday unveiled a 50% hike in its medium-term profit forecast, now aiming for at least 750 billion yen ($4.7 billion) in income before tax in the year through March 2031.

Nomura will aim to generate 150 billion yen in annual pretax income by March 2031 from investment management, up from 100 billion yen previously.

Even as investor concerns over the creditworthiness of global private credit funds has led to a wave of redemption requests in recent months, Nomura is aiming to increase by a factor of 10 its private credit assets under management within its investment management business.

Nomura is aiming to manage assets of more than $5 billion by the end of financial year 2030-31, up from just $500 million in the year ended March 2026.

“Our private credit balance refers to the distribution of private credit held as investment products, so the risk we are taking on our own balance sheet is extremely limited,” head of investment management Hiroyasu Koike said.

($1 = 159.2500 yen)

(Reporting by Anton Bridge; Editing by David Holmes)