JК
Dogs and Demons :: Керр Алекс
Страница: 63 из 270Machiavelli writes: «If a man behaves with patience and circumspection and the time and circumstances are such that this method is called for, he will prosper; but if time and circumstances change he will be ruined because he does not change his policy... Thus a man who is circumspect, when circumstances demand impetuous behavior, is unequal to the task, and so he comes to grief.»
One aspect of Japan's failure to keep in touch with reality was that the Ministry of Finance and Japan's banks and brokerage firms failed to acquire the technology used in financial markets elsewhere. This may be one of the most surprising aspects of the Bubble, for it runs against the common wisdom about Japan's alleged gift for high technology.
If debts need never be repaid and stocks produce no yields, what is the measuring rod of value? There was none, aside from Madame Nui's toad. In the 1980s Japan's securities houses, dominated by Nomura, towered over all competitors and many believed them to be practically invincible. But traders at Nomura and other brokerage houses did not learn the mathematical tools that Wall Street brokers developed in the 1980s, and that led to the complex computer trading and new financial instruments that dominate the market today. Since 1991, they have seen one long series of retrenchments, with Nomura consistently losing money, or barely scraping by in the United States and Great Britain. Daiwa cut its foreign branches from thirty to eighteen in 1999; Nikko reduced its overseas operations; and Nomura is closing foreign desks. By January 1998, Japanese securities firms had fallen completely out of the ranking for the world's top-ten bond dealers. Nomura made it only to No. 13; the other firms did not get into even the top twenty. And by then foreign brokerage houses were handling almost 40 percent of all trades on the TSE. In the fall of 1997, Yamaichi Securities, one of the Big Four brokerages, declared bankruptcy when more than $2 billion in losses surfaced in hidden offshore accounts. And then there were three. «Just as the U.S. brokers toppled England's largest securities firms, the same thing is happening here in Japan,» said Saito Atsushi, Nomura's executive managing director.
However, there was to be one last mission for MOF's financial machine to accomplish, albeit a suicide mission. MOF decided that it should expand into Asia, which it considered Japan's natural sphere of influence. Land prices had been rising in Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia for decades-all the old Bubble rules still seemed to apply there.
One aspect of Japan's failure to keep in touch with reality was that the Ministry of Finance and Japan's banks and brokerage firms failed to acquire the technology used in financial markets elsewhere. This may be one of the most surprising aspects of the Bubble, for it runs against the common wisdom about Japan's alleged gift for high technology.
If debts need never be repaid and stocks produce no yields, what is the measuring rod of value? There was none, aside from Madame Nui's toad. In the 1980s Japan's securities houses, dominated by Nomura, towered over all competitors and many believed them to be practically invincible. But traders at Nomura and other brokerage houses did not learn the mathematical tools that Wall Street brokers developed in the 1980s, and that led to the complex computer trading and new financial instruments that dominate the market today. Since 1991, they have seen one long series of retrenchments, with Nomura consistently losing money, or barely scraping by in the United States and Great Britain. Daiwa cut its foreign branches from thirty to eighteen in 1999; Nikko reduced its overseas operations; and Nomura is closing foreign desks. By January 1998, Japanese securities firms had fallen completely out of the ranking for the world's top-ten bond dealers. Nomura made it only to No. 13; the other firms did not get into even the top twenty. And by then foreign brokerage houses were handling almost 40 percent of all trades on the TSE. In the fall of 1997, Yamaichi Securities, one of the Big Four brokerages, declared bankruptcy when more than $2 billion in losses surfaced in hidden offshore accounts. And then there were three. «Just as the U.S. brokers toppled England's largest securities firms, the same thing is happening here in Japan,» said Saito Atsushi, Nomura's executive managing director.
However, there was to be one last mission for MOF's financial machine to accomplish, albeit a suicide mission. MOF decided that it should expand into Asia, which it considered Japan's natural sphere of influence. Land prices had been rising in Thailand, Malaysia, and Indonesia for decades-all the old Bubble rules still seemed to apply there.