As of January 2021, the Financial Services Agency of Japan (the “JFSA”) established the “Financial Market Entry Office” (formerly known as the “Financial Market Entry Consultation Desk”, the “JFSA Market Entry Office”) as part of its efforts to transform Japan into an international financial centre to attract foreign businesses and highly-skilled professionals from around the world – with a specific focus on investment managers.
The purpose of the JFSA Market Entry Office is to ease the overall process by which foreign financial institutions may enter into Japan and seek to register with the JFSA to engage in a financial instruments business. In connection with such objective, the JFSA Market Entry Office provides a wide range of English language support and assistance to foreign financial institutions that are considering establishing an office in Japan and register with the JFSA to engage in a financial instruments business.
Since its initial inception in 2017, the range of services offered by the JFSA Market Entry Office has significantly evolved in scope. While the Financial Market Entry Consultation Desk previously only offered general consultation services (with such consultation services still being provided), key additional services now provided by the JFSA Market Entry Office include the ability for new applicants to submit its application documents in connection with its financial instruments business registration in English, and the relatively new “Financial Start-up Support Program” (the “JFSA Subsidy”) that is currently being administered by Tricor K.K (“Tricor Japan”), in its capacity as the exclusive delegate of the JFSA.
By providing an overview of the JFSA Market Entry Office as well as the wide range of services and assistance that are currently being offered, this Client Alert will seek to properly inform those foreign financial institutions that are considering establishing operations in Japan.
In connection with the foregoing, this Client Alert will cover the following topics:
- eligibility criteria to receive English language registration support from the JFSA Market Entry Office;
- overview of the English language financial instruments business registration process;
- summary of supplemental services provided by the JFSA Market Entry Office; and
- discussion of the newly available JFSA Subsidy.
It should be noted that the range and scope of services being offered by the JFSA Market Entry Office is continuously growing. While we have written about the JFSA Market Entry Office in the past, this Client Alert will revisit this entire program as a whole reflecting its features as of April 1, 2022.
Please click here to read the full version of this Client Alert.
The Tokyo Investment Management team at Withers has extensive experience in assisting foreign financial institutions and is hopeful that this Client Alert can help those that are considering expanding its business into Japan.
If you have any queries, please feel free to reach out to your usual Withers contacts or to Koji Yamamoto or Yoshiyuki Omori.
