THIS SESSION WILL BE HELD IN ENGLISH

Earlier this year the Financial Services Agency (FSA) introduced its principles-based regime to ensure that firms put the interests of their customers at the heart of their business. The policy was initially referred to as the  fiduciary duty principles but is now more commonly described as  ‘Customer Oriented Business Conduct’ (COBC).

Mr. Masayuki Watanabe from Miyake & Partners will give an overview of this new policy and the evolving regulatory environment and how market-based outcomes play a key role. The expectation is that customers will gravitate towards financial institutions that provide better outcomes for its customers by embracing COBC at the expense of those firms which do not fully embrace it.

Mr. Watanabe will give two presentations, one in Japanese and the other in English and will:

• Set out his views of the FSA’s expectations of financial institutions
• Make a comparative assessment of the published policies released by various financial Institutions
• Explore different practices and activities of financial institutions including some which are distinctive and innovative and those that are stressing competitive measures to promote the attractiveness of their firm.
• Set out views of his analysis of the policies that have been published by  foreign financial institutions and suggest possible areas where improvements could be introduced or would benefit from some attention.

Mr Watanabe is a partner at Miyake & Partners, where his specialisms include: financial regulations, corporate governance, having previously worked at Anderson Mori & Tomotsune. He is currently also an external director at several Japanese non-bank companies. Mr. Watanabe graduated from the University of Tokyo (Faculty of Law) in 1995, was admitted as an Attorney at Law in 1997 and in 2007 received an LLM from Columbia Law School.  He is a member of the Bar Association of Japan serving on a number of committees.