Mirae Asset Securities to Buy Japan's Sanko Securities

14th Overseas M&A

Mirae Asset Securities is making a full-scale push into Japan's stock market, the world's third-largest by market capitalization. The company plans to acquire Sanko Securities, a unit of Okasan Securities Group, to secure a local brokerage license and expand in the market with its mobile trading system and marketing capabilities.

Mirae Asset Securities said on October 29 that it had signed a stock purchase agreement through its U.S. subsidiary, US Holdings, to acquire a 100% stake in Sanko Securities from Okasan Securities Group. Mirae Asset plans to inject 12 billion yen ($79.3 million) into US Holdings for the deal. Of that, 5 billion yen ($33 million) will be used for the acquisition, while the remaining 7 billion yen ($46.2 million) will be invested in Sanko Securities to expand the local business.

Founded in October 1953, Sanko Securities is a small brokerage. As of the fiscal year ended in March, it had net assets of about 4.6 billion yen ($30.4 million) and annual net profit of 48 million yen ($317,000). The company has recently exited its retail business through restructuring and is now focused on proprietary trading. That business generates profit by trading stocks and bonds with the firm's own capital.

Mirae Asset said it plans to use the acquisition to secure a local securities license and eventually restart the retail business.

Park Hyeon-joo Expands Overseas Footprint Beyond the U.S. and U.K. to Japan

Japan Stocks Keep Growing on Value-Up Push; Mirae Asset to Leverage MTS and Marketing

"Going forward, we will pursue mergers and acquisitions in countries with larger economies than South Korea."

Park Hyeon-joo, chairman of Mirae Asset Group, made the remark during a special lecture at the Kyung Hee University-Hankyung Business Insight Forum on October 27. The comment underscored his view that competing through overseas M&A requires moving into much bigger markets. Mirae Asset Group has already pursued a string of overseas acquisitions, starting with U.S. exchange-traded fund manager Global X in 2018 and followed by local brokerages and asset managers in Australia, the U.K. and India.

Japan is his next destination. Mirae Asset plans to use the Sanko Securities acquisition as a foothold to enter the country's proprietary trading and retail markets. The strategy is to buy a smaller brokerage, establish a local base and then build up the business directly.

Building a Japan Beachhead for $33 Million

On October 29, Japan's securities industry data showed Sanko Securities had net assets of about 4.6 billion yen ($30.4 million) and annual net profit of 48 million yen ($317,000) as of the fiscal year ended in March. It recently transferred its retail business to another Okasan Group affiliate and is concentrating on proprietary trading. Mirae Asset's purchase price is 5 billion yen ($33 million). That is about one-tenth of the roughly $376 million it spent on the acquisition of Indian brokerage Sharekhan.

Mirae Asset chose Sanko Securities because of its local license and relatively small size. Sanko holds a Type I Financial Instruments Business Operator license, which allows it to trade stocks and bonds. Rather than establish a new entity and go through Japan's brokerage registration process from scratch, Mirae Asset opted to buy an existing securities firm and use it as its local operating base. Because Sanko has already undergone restructuring, the burden of taking over branches and an existing client organization is also limited.

Once the transaction closes, Mirae Asset plans to expand the business starting with proprietary trading. That business invests the brokerage's own capital in stocks and bonds to generate returns. The company plans to keep Sanko's proprietary trading staff while strengthening capital management and risk controls. It will later restart the retail business after completing internal reorganization. Mirae Asset plans to use its mobile trading system, or MTS, and marketing organization to attract individual investors and build a sales network. A full-scale rollout is likely to take one to two years.

More U.S. and China M&A in Sight

Mirae Asset is heading to Japan as the country's financial market undergoes structural change. Japan's Nikkei 225 topped its bubble-era peak of 38,915.87 in 2024 for the first time in about 34 years, driven by corporate governance reforms and stronger shareholder returns. The index then rose above 70,000 in June 2026. The gains were aided by the expansion of tax benefits under the revamped Nippon Individual Savings Account, or NISA, introduced in 2024. The policy is steering household money that had long sat in deposits into stocks and investment trusts, helping to expand the markets for ETFs and wealth-management products.

The transaction is also Mirae Asset Group's 14th overseas M&A deal. Since taking part in the acquisition of global golf brand Titleist through a private equity fund in 2011, Mirae Asset Securities has invested in a range of overseas assets including hotels and office buildings. More recently, it has broadened its overseas financial footprint through acquisitions of ETF managers and brokerages in the U.S., Australia and the U.K. Including Sanko Securities, the group's cumulative overseas M&A total stands at about $3.5 billion.

Park is now looking to the U.S. and China. At the forum two days earlier, he said an M&A deal in mainland China could also be nearly wrapped up within this year.

Lee Sun-a / Choi Man-su, Korea Economic Daily reporters suna@hankyung.com