Nomura to enter U.S. retail mutual fund market

Typography

Nomura Asset Management said it would invest significant resources to market and distribute The Japan Fund, the oldest independent U.S. fund focused on investing in Japan and which has over $300 million in assets under management.

TOKYO (Reuters) - Nomura Holdings Inc <8604.T> has inked a deal to become the investment manager of a U.S. mutual fund specializing in Japanese issues, marking its full-scale entry into the U.S. retail mutual fund market.

Nomura Asset Management said it would invest significant resources to market and distribute The Japan Fund, the oldest independent U.S. fund focused on investing in Japan and which has over $300 million in assets under management.

Japan's largest brokerage group replaces Fidelity as the fund's asset manager. Fidelity has its own fund specializing in Japanese issues.

"This alliance provides Nomura Asset Management with an expedited entrance into the U.S. retail mutual fund market. It allows us to leap frog to a leadership position in the marketplace," Shigeru Shinohara, Chief Executive of Nomura Asset Management U.S.A., said in a statement on Monday.

!ADVERTISEMENT!

Nomura also hopes to offer several other funds specializing in stocks from other Asian countries such as China and India, a spokesman for Nomura Asset said.

The broker is eager to expand its overseas presence and also

said on Monday that has started a fund worth 2.1 billion euros ($3.3 billion) to buy unsold loans and undervalued companies in Europe.

(Reporting by Yuka Obayashi and Edwina Gibbs)