Bloomberg News reported that “Nomura Holdings Inc.” (Nomura Holdings Inc.) Japan’s largest brokerage firm has been fined 21.8 million yen (US$5 million) for manipulating the Japanese government bond futures market.
An employee of the company’s domestic securities unit is suspected of illegally manipulating the price of Japanese government bond futures contracts in 2021, the Securities Regulatory Commission said Wednesday. The dealer profited by buying or selling large volumes of contracts without any intention to buy or sell them all.
Although the finesNomuraAlthough it may be of little value, it could have a significant impact on the company’s image and reputation at a crucial time as Nomura is increasingly focusing on the Japanese market to drive growth in its trading and investment banking businesses. The recovery in the Japanese bond market after the Bank of Japan changed its monetary policy further reinforces the importance of this market to Nomura.
“Such actions are very serious and undermine the credibility of the securities company as a market operator,” a SEC official said. The regulator decided to punish the company instead of the employee because the employee traded on Nomura’s behalf and the company recognized the resulting profits.
“We take this matter very seriously and apologize to our clients and all parties involved for the inconvenience,” Nomura said in a statement. “We have been working to improve our Japanese government bond futures trading since these transactions occurred, and the company pledges to continue improving internal controls to prevent such incidents from happening again.”
Nomura shares closed down 1.5 percent in Tokyo on Wednesday after the Yomiuri newspaper reported on the investigation. However, the company’s shares are up 21 percent this year on a year-to-date basis.
refer: bloomberg
