With pretax losses in four of the five past quarters in Europe and difficulties compounded by Brexit, the financial services group looks to redirect its resources to Asia and the United States.
After almost a decade of struggling to generate profits in Europe, Nomura Holdings wants to direct its resources toward more profitable regions like Asia and the United States and focus on its consulting business, chief executive officer Koji Nagai said in an interview with Bloomberg.
Globally, the firm aims to expand its advisory services and primary business, which includes helping clients issues stocks and bonds, reducing its exposure to market risks, Nagai said. In the United States, it hopes to grow its investment banking arm.
«Our key words are ‘America’, ‘corporate clients’ and ‘solutions business’,» the company’s chief executive officer said in an interview with Reuters.
The firm’s status in the United States, which has the world’s largest pool in investment banking fees, is relatively weak, though Nomura is open to hiring whole teams of investment bankers or even making acquisitions, Nagai said to Bloomberg.
Losses in Europe
This would likely mean shedding part of the 3,000-strong workforce at its London office, which will see reduced capital of around $3 billion from $5 billion as it no longer will be the firm’s global booking hub, according to a company presentation. Instead, the London office will only book transactions from the greater European region.
Nomura has already shrunk its European operations significantly in recent years, with almost 1,000 jobs in Europe cut this decade. According to Bloomberg, Nomura posted a pretax loss of 16.8 billion yen ($151 million) for the region in the first half of the current fiscal year, while a slump in fix-income trading saw its wholesale revenue fall 29 percent year-on-year.
