History

The Company was established in 1918, incorporated in 1931, registered as a securities firm in 1948 and became a member of the Tokyo Stock Exchange in 1949. Prior to 1995, the Company was small and tiny conventional securities broker ranked last among industry peers in terms of revenue and offered retail brokerage services through a conventional sales force and branch offices.

The Company has emerged as an industry leader by the structural reforms to actively take advantage of the deregulation of the financial services industry under the leadership of Michio Matsui, its current president & CEO. In 1996, the Company became the first broker in Japan to eliminate stock custodian fees. In 1997, following a partial deregulation of Japanese brokerage commissions, the Company also became the first company in Japan to announce deep reductions in trading commissions for shares traded on the Japanese OTC market, cutting them by one-half.

In the late 1990s, the Company shifted its operations to serve investors who do not require investment advice by reducing its traditional sales force and sales branches, instead taking customer orders by telephone. In light of the proliferation of the Internet and deregulation of brokerage commissions, however, the Company decided to eliminate its sales force and sales branches entirely in order to refocus its business as an online brokerage. The Company’s Netstock online brokerage services, introduced in 1998, have become its principal line of business.

Drawing on decades of the experiences and experiments under the structural reforms, the Company has adopted itself to the changing business environment. That is the significance of its existence as a pioneer. The table below reflects highlights of the Company’s developments since the introduction of Netstock: