SBI Holdings, Rakuten Group and Monex Group are among brokerages in Japan that also sold Credit Suisse¡¯s riskiest bonds to retail investors, highlighting the widening fallout of these products in the country.
The operators of the nation¡¯s three major online brokerages offered the Swiss lender¡¯s Additional Tier 1 notes for a minimum purchase amount of $200,000, according to copies of the firms¡¯ product explanatory materials seen by Bloomberg News. The documents obtained also raised questions over whether information over the risks associated with the product was properly disclosed to investors.
Switzerland¡¯s decision in March to write down the bonds as part of a government-led rescue of Credit Suisse shocked investors in Japan, who bought around ?140 billion ($1 billion) worth of the debt. Clients of Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group¡¯s securities venture with Morgan Stanley took the lion share of the hit. The debacle in a country that¡¯s trying to push its citizens to invest more has prompted regulators to look into whether the firms properly explained the risks before selling the bonds.
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