The House Of Nomura: The Rise To Power Of The World's Most Powerful Company

The House of Nomura is the true story of a dynasty, and the tale told here is on an epic scale. The story begins in the nineteenth century with Tokushichi Nomura I, the bastard son of a noble family living in rural Japan, and ends with insider trading and global political powerbrokering in the late 1980s. It is the story of the creation of the most powerful company in the world, Nomura Securities, a firm so wealthy it could buy up every stockbroking house in London, merely with its own resources. Nomura’s stranglehold on Japan’s financial markets is so strong that Ministry of Finance officials consult the company on all major policy decisions. While the interests of Nomura are those of the Japanese government, its penetration of the US bond market is such that were Nomura to cease purchasing US treasury bonds, the American economy would be at grave risk. The House of Nomura reveals how this frightening concentration of power has come about and how it is wielded in the interests of Japan. It also lays bare the incestuous links between politicians, stockbrokers, bureaucrats, and businessmen — the very links that toppled the Japanese government in 1989. The author is the first Westerner to have been granted access to the family papers of the Nomura dynasty, and, by means of exclusive interviews with Tokushichi’s descendants, he recreates in fascinating detail the colourful personalities and dazzling lifestyles of the family in pre-war Japan, its rise to power, its sudden decline, and its dramatic resurgence to supremacy.