He is sitting in his office in a shiny skyscraper in central Tokyo, a symbol of Merrill Lynch’s aspirations in the land of the rising sun. In 1998, the US broker made waves when it acquired the failed Yamaichi Securities, one of the big four local brokerages. It looked as if a foreign bank had finally got an inside track in Japan’s securities industry. But, with the country’s economy in a tailspin, Merrill was unable to turn things around and was forced to lay off staff and close branches as losses mounted.
But, if cost remains a key issue for Merrill in Japan (as elsewhere), Mr Fujisawa is confident that the broker’s lean years are behind it, as the Japanese economy marches onward and upward. “There has been a very good recovery of the Japanese economy – and I believe it is a very firm one from a long-term viewpoint,” he says.
